Return To The Black
by Shutterbug5269
Summary: My submission to the #CastleHalloweenBash a sequel to my fanfic No One Can Hear You Scream this time following the plot to the movie "Aliens"
1. Homecoming

**Chapter One  
Homecoming**

* * *

 _I'm not the one who's so far away  
When I feel the snake bite enter my veins  
Never did I wanna be here again  
And I don't remember why I came _

"Voodoo" Composed by Sully Erna  
Performed by Godsmack

* * *

In the depths of space there is neither air nor friction. The only source of light, that of the pinpricks of distant stars, more notable for their radiation than their light this far out. This far from a star system or source of gravity there is little to impede the movement of a single tumbling man-made object on a course bringing it toward a small unimpressive star named Sol.

Power had long since been prioritized to the single hyper-sleep pod within the lifeboat from the long disappeared _USCSS Nostromo_ and the three dreamers cocooned inside, the doomed transport ship's only survivors. The _Narcissus_ AI's last act before powering down had been one last full burn to set their course.

Though the small ship had long since ceased level flight and begun to tumble, it was still drawn inexorably along on the course the AI had set. Only recently finding it's way into more occupied space, it's transmitter began broadcasting their distress signal on emergency channels.

 _"We should reach the outer frontier in another five months or so. Once we're in range, the network should pick up our SOS and put out the word. Castle and I have a statement prepared for the media, which will include a full report to the proper authorities concerning actions taken by officers of the Weyland Yutani Corporation in violation of interstellar law."_

 _"Acting Captain Kate Beckett, ident number 759/L2-01N and Communications Specialist Richard Castle ident number 121/C2/01C, last survivors of the commercial starship_ _ _USCSS Nostromo__ _, signing off."_

* * *

Once within range of the primary space-lanes, it did not take long for the broadcast from the Narcissus to reach equipment capable of detecting and interpreting the distress signal for what it was. Another ship in the same region of space, the Bison II class _USCSS Serenity_ altered course from her supply run at her captain's command to investigate.

Captain Malcolm Reynolds was not one to ignore a distress signal. Interstellar law or not, he knew the only help that transport ships out in the black could truly hope for was each other. He'd answered more than one distress signal, only to arrive too late. Finding either dead bodies in the pods, or crews huddled dead in the mess from the suicide pills after their ship's distress signal had either gone unheard or ignored and their air ran out.

He had stood in the witness box to testify against more than one captain who had ignored a distress call, leaving a crew to die out there alone in the black.

Malcolm Reynolds wasn't a man often given to sentiment, but he could no more leave a crew stranded out in the black than he could cut off his own head. He was fully aware that one day it might be _his_ ship and crew in need and he hoped the captain who got _his_ distress signal held to the same ideals he did.

* * *

It took three tries to get a magnetic grapple latched on in the right place on the tumbling shuttle to pull it level and winch it close enough to lock on. Once the shuttle pod was close enough, two more sets of mooring cables were latched on, the sounds of the locking procedure echoed through both vessels.

"Hard seal established," Serenity's pilot and warrant officer Hoban "Wash" Washburne stated, "our little leaf on the wind is secured. All indicators show green."

Captain Reynolds selected three of his crew to board the derelict shuttle.

Wearing full pressure suits, First Officer Zoe Washbourne, Science Officer Simon Tam and Engineering Technician Jayne Cobb entered the airlock, bearing a cutting torch, portable lights and other equipment. They waited patiently while the airlock cycled. When the outer-lock door slid aside, their first sight of the lifeboat was disappointing: no internal lights visible through the port in the door, no sign of life within.

The door refused to respond when the external controls were pressed.

"Shuttle's exterior door is jammed shut, Captain," Zoe reported into her helmet pickup, "structural damage, perhaps a pressure leak. The sealant bottles seem to have fired."

After making certain there was no air in the lifeboat's cabin, Jayne went to work on the door with his welding torch, slicing into the door first on one side, then the other until his cuts met at the bottom of the barrier. After shutting down his torch, Jayne kicked the metal aside.

The lifeboat's interior was as dark and still as a tomb. Clothes were strewn across the floor of the cabin, below where they must have been floating before Serenity's artificial gravity asserted itself. The only interior light visible not produced by their suits was a dim indicator up near the front of the cabin. Fanning out behind Zoe, hands drifting to the pistols at their sides for no reason other than the dim, suddenly claustrophobic confines of the shuttle creeped them out.

As they approached the front of the shuttle, the familiar dome of a hyper-sleep capsule glowed from within. The boarding party exchanged a glance before approaching. Zoe and Jayne leaned over the thick glass cover of the transparent sarcophagus. Behind them, Jayne studied his instrumentation and muttered aloud.

"Internal pressure positive, hull and systems integrity looks nominal. Nothing appears damaged; just shut down to conserve energy."

"Haven't seen a hyper-sleep capsule like this one since flight school," Simon reported. "Capsule pressure reads steady and still receiving power, though the batteries have just about had it. Look how dim the internal readouts are."

"Good-lookin' couple in there." Zoe commented

"Good-lookin', my eye." Jayne spat, sounding disappointed. "Life function diodes are all green. That means she's alive. There goes our salvage profit, guys."

Both Zoe and Simon leveled disgusted looks at Jayne.

"Stow that shit, Jayne," Zoe snapped at the man for his lack of humanity, "someday that could be us."

Jayne didn't even look up from his inspection of the inside of the pod. After running an appraising eye at the woman inside, something else caught his eye and he gestured in surprise.

"Hey!" He exclaimed, "there's something in there with her. Nonhuman. Looks alive too. Can't see too clearly. Part of it's trapped between them. It's orange-ish."

"Orange?" Zoe pushed past both Simon and Jayne to press the face-plate of her helmet against the transparent barrier. "Got claws, whatever it is."

"Maybe it's an alien life-form, huh?" Jayne offered, "That'd be worth some bucks."

The woman inside, whom Jayne thought he wouldn't mind getting to know better under different circumstances, shifted ever so slightly in the pod, sending a few strands of hair on the ergonomic cushion under her head to one side, more fully revealing the creature that slept tight against her.

When Jayne got a closer look, he snorted disgustedly, "No such luck. It's just a cat."

* * *

 **One Week Later  
Sol System Gateway Station**

Kate Beckett slowly emerged from the fog of sleep. She felt like crap, more so than she ever had recalled coming out of hyper-sleep. Listening was a struggle, opening her eyes seemed out of the question. Her throat felt dry, and parched with a faintly resinous flavor she didn't recognize.

Her lips parted on a groan as her body slowly checked in. Air came rushing up from her lungs, which ached with the exertion. It took her a few tries, but she finally got her vocal chords to successfully form words.

"Thirsty," She husked out so quietly she feared nobody would hear her.

Almost immediately, something smooth and cool slid between her lips. The shock of dampness almost overwhelmed her. Memory nearly caused her to reject the water tube. In another time and place that kind of insertion was a prelude to a particularly unique and loathsome demise. Only water flowed from this tube, however. It was accompanied by a calm voice intoning advice.

'Don't swallow. Sip slowly.'

She obeyed, though a part of her mind screamed at her to suck the restoring liquid as fast as possible. Oddly enough, she did not feel dehydrated, only terribly thirsty.

'Good,' she whispered huskily.

'Got anything more substantial?'

'It's too soon,' said the voice.

'The heck it is. How about some fruit juice?'

'Citric acid will tear you up.' The voice hesitated, considering, then said, 'Try this.'

Once again the gleaming metal tube slipped smoothly into her mouth. She sucked at it pleasurably. Sugared iced tea cascaded down her throat, soothing both thirst and her first cravings for food.

When she'd had enough, she said so, and the tube was withdrawn.

A woman stepped inside and the door swished closed behind her, Kate could see the complex medical equipment to her immediate left including the automated medical unit - a much smaller unit than the auto-doc on the _Nostromo_ \- which had responded so swiftly to not only her rise to consciousness, but also her plea for first water and then sweetened iced tea.

The machine hung motionless and ready from its track on the ceiling, sensors within it's streamlined frame quietly monitoring everything happening inside her body, ready to adjust medication, provide food and drink, or summon human help should the need arise. Which it obviously had once she was fully awake and apparently lucid.

The newcomer smiled at the patient and used a remote retrieved from her breast pocket to gently raise the backrest of Kate's bed. The patch on her shirt, which identified her as a senior RN, was bright with color against the background of her crisp white uniform. Kate eyed her warily, unable to get a read on the woman, the first human she had seen since slipping into hyper-sleep. Her voice was pleasant, however, maternal without being cloying.

"Sedation's wearing off. I don't think you need any more." The charge nurse stated, "Can you understand me?"

Kate nodded slowly. The nurse considered her patient's appearance and seemed to reach a decision.

"Let's try something new, shall we?" She said, "Why don't I open the window?"

Kate's heartbeat ticked up a fraction, then returned to normal when logic reminded her that there were no openable windows on a space station. The Nurse's smile weakened just a fraction and promptly returned when the monitors noted Kate's vitals returned to normal. That single lapse told Kate's detective instincts all she needed to know about the woman. Her demeanor was professional and practiced, not heartfelt.

The woman pointed her remote towards the wall across from the foot of the bed.

"Shield your eyes for a moment," she warned.

Kate squinted as requested as a motor hummed softly, and the wall plate outside slid into the ceiling. Harsh light filled the room for the half second it took for the outside light to be filtered and softened, thought it was still a shock to Kate's system.

Outside lay a vast sweeping vista, framed by Gateway Station's modular habitats, the plastic cells strung together like children's blocks, but dominating the scene was the bright blue brown and green curve of the Earth. Before her, Africa swam in an ocean of dark blue, the Mediterranean a sapphire separating the Sahara from the European continent. It was nothing that Kate had never seen before, first in school then in primary flight training, but after years in deep space, it still felt like home and she was glad to see the planet of her birth still spinning.

It was comforting, familiar, reassuring, like a worn-down teddy bear. The only thing missing was the man whom she most wanted to share it with. But bereft of his presence, she could not seem to get the question she most wanted answered past her lips. _Where's Castle? Where's my husband?_

"How are we today, Ms Beckett?" The nurse asked, but it took a moment for Kate to register that the woman was speaking to her.

"Terrible," Kate replied sullenly, her mind tilting with scenarios she did not wish to contemplate.

"Just terrible?" The nurse asked. Kate suddenly wondered why she didn't have a name badge.

"That's better than yesterday, at least," the nurse continued, "I'd call "terrible" a major improvement from atrocious."

Kate squeezed her eyelids shut and opened them slowly. The Earth was still there and so was the nurse and her most important - heretofore unasked - questions mocking her as they echoed inside her head.

"How long have I been on Gateway Station?" she asked by rote.

"A couple of days." the nurse replied, the smile plastered to her face suddenly not so comforting.

"Feels longer." Kate stated by way of reply

"Do you feel up to a visitor?" the nurse asked and Kate's heart leaped in her chest.

'There are two of them, actually." The nurse replied, at the swish of the door.

A man entered, one most notable by the fact that she did _not_ recognize him, but she knew his fat, orange, bored-looking burden

"Charlie!" Kate exclaimed, sitting up straight, the first genuine smile since she woke springing to her lips. The man gratefully relinquished possession of the big tomcat, which Kate drew to her chest and cuddled to her like he was her firstborn

"Charlie-boy, oh my God look at you, you sweet ball of fluff, you!" Kate whispered to the cat in her arms as if he was the only thing keeping her afloat in a sea of uncertainty.

Charlie patiently endured what was for him certainly, an embarrassing display, so typical of humans, with all the dignity his kind was heir to, displaying the usual tolerance felines have for human beings.

The still unknown man pulled a chair close to the bed and patiently waited for Ripley to take notice of him. He was in his thirties, good-looking without being flashy, and dressed in a nondescript business suit.

Kate acknowledged his presence with a nod but continued to reserve her full attention to the cat. Eventually however it became clear that he was not going to settle for being ignored.

"Nice room," he said, though it was clear he didn't mean a word of it.

He looked like a country boy, but didn't talk like one, Kate thought as he edged the chair a little closer to her. Which she found more than a little invasive.

"My name's Vaughn, Eric Vaughn," He said, "I work for the Company, but other than that, I think I'm an okay guy. Glad to see you're feeling better."

Though Kate was wary of this stranger, he at least sounded to her as though he meant it.

"I'm told the weakness and disorientation should pass soon, though you don't look particularly disoriented to me. Side effects of such a long period in hyper-sleep, they told me. Biology wasn't my favorite subject. I was better at figures. For example, yours seems to have come through in pretty good shape."

Kate glared at him, and not just because of the obvious come-on. She was not impressed with that at all, but the words _unusually long hyper-sleep_ sang out to her interrogator's mind and all of her cop instincts kicked in.

"What do you mean by _"unusually long hyper-sleep"_. How long was it?" She gestured towards the watching nurse. "They certainly aren't offering me anything."

Vaughn's lack of response did not fill Kate with confidence.

"Where's Castle?" she finally asked, "Where's my husband?"

"I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, Ms. Beckett, but your husband didn't make it. His life signs flat-lined seven days before you were picked up."

Kate paled, suddenly finding it difficult to breathe, a lump in her chest right below her heart became a palpable thing.

"You drifted right through the core systems," Vaughn told her. "your emergency beacon failed. It was blind luck that that a transport en-route out of the system was able to triangulate your position from your recorded message when they…"

He hesitated when Kate suddenly turned pale, her eyes widening.

"Are you all right?" He muttered

Kate coughed again and again, as if choking on something, feeling pressure where there shouldn't be, her expression one of dawning horror.

Vaughn tried to hand her a glass of water from the nightstand, only to have her slap it away. It struck the floor and shattered.

Charlie leaped from the bed to the furthest point in the room he could get from her, his fur standing on end, yowling and spitting. His claws made rapid scratching sounds on the smooth plastic as he scrambled away from the bed.

Kate grabbed at her chest, her back arching as the convulsions began. She looked as if she were strangling, or struggling to give birth.

"Code Blue to Four Fifteen!" The Nurse shouted, springing into action "Code Blue, Four One Five!"

She and Vaughn clutched Kate's shoulders on both sides as she began convulsing on the mattress as a doctor and two more techs came pounding into the room.

 _It couldn't be happening._ Kate's mind flashed in panic _It couldn't!_

"No—noooooo!" She screamed aloud.

Covers went flying as the orderlies attempted to restrain her. One foot sent a man sprawling while the other kicked over the crash cart they brought with them From beneath a cabinet Charlie glared out at his mistress and hissed, claws out and fur standing on end as he prepared to flee at the first opportunity

"Hold her!" the doctor shouted. "Get me an airway, _stat!_ Nurse Adelaide, Fifteen cc's of—!"

An explosion of blood stained Kate's hospital gown crimson, which began to pyramid as something unseen rose beneath it. Stunned, the medical personnel backed off.

Kate looked on helplessly in absolute panic as the garment tore away.

The nurse collapsed. The doctor made gagging sounds as the eyeless, toothed worm emerged from Kate's shattered rib cage and turned slowly until its fanged mouth was only a foot from her face, and screeched, drowning out everything else, echoing, reverberating through her entire being as she…

* * *

… sat up screaming, her body snapping into an upright position in the bed. She was alone in the darkened hospital room. Clutching pathetically at her chest Kate fought to regain the breath the nightmare had stolen. Her body was intact and for the most part functional. It was only a dream... a really bad one at that. _Only a dream_ she thought to herself over and over again _. Only a dream_

Her eyes moved jerkily as she scanned the room, her mind still working through the last dregs of her terror. To her relief, she found nothing lying in ambush on the floor, or behind the cabinets waiting for her to let down her guard. Only silent machines quietly doing their work and the comfortable bed under her. She held one fist protectively against her sternum, as if to reassure herself constantly of its continued inviolability. The long healed bullet wound a reminder that eventually all nightmares end, but now she wasn't so sure.

As her eyes became more attuned to the dim light of the hospital room, her eyes finally focused on the one thing that had been missing in her room from the dream. The large, solid presence of her husband, lying in the bed immediately next to hers, his eyes closed in a sedative induced sleep, his very presence in the room made her feel more secure. To her nightmare fueled mind, Richard Castle was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

Kate jumped slightly, shaken from her contemplation of her sleeping husband as the video monitor suspended over her bed hummed to life. An older woman, obviously the night charge nurse gazed anxiously down at her. Her face was full of genuine and not simply professional concern.

"Bad dreams again, Ms Beckett?" The nurse asked, "Do you want something to help you sleep?"

A light switched on at the panel next to her bed, offering the appropriate dose of sedative.

"No, thank you," Kate replied, "I think I've slept enough."

"If you change your mind," The nurse on the screen reminded her before logging off, "just use your bed buzzer."

With that, the screen darkened.

Kate slowly leaned back against the raised mattress and touched one of the numerous buttons set in the side of her nightstand. The window screen that covered the far wall slid into the ceiling, bathing her husband's sleeping form in soft light, the window filters keeping the room dim in favor of the patient sleeping in the next bed. Castle was here, safely beside her, the portion of Gateway brilliantly lit by nighttime lights and, beyond that, the night-shrouded globe of the Earth. Neither of which capturing her attention quite like her husband did though. That last dream had been bad.

Something landed on the bed next to her, but she didn't jump. It was a familiar, welcome shape and she hugged his long-legged body tightly to her, ignoring Charlie's casual meow of protest.

"It's okay, Charlie," she soothed as she petted the cat and stared at her sleeping husband in a way she might have called creepy once upon a time. "We made it, Charlie-boy, we're all home safe. I'm sorry I scared you. It'll be all right. It's going to be all right."

She wished she could convince herself of that. Perhaps she could eventually believe it, if only she could get the dreams to stop.

* * *

 _ ****Author's Note** When I was beginning to write this, adding the crew of the Serenity to this universe just kind flowed naturally from me. The guy complaining that, with the crew's survival, their salvage money went out the window sounded so much like Jayne, I simply could not help myself.**_

 _ **No, there will me no rehash of "The Squab and the Quail" in this story. Nope, absofuckinglutely not. As it turns out, the company suit in the original Aliens universe (played marvelously by Paul Reiser in the movie) is named Carter Burke and I didn't want there to be confusion with Dr. Worf. So I gave him the familiar name of another conniving suit from the Castle-verse.**_

 _ **Enjoy.**_


	2. Gateway To Home

**Chapter Two  
Gateway To Home**

* * *

 _"And all our yesterdays have lighted fools_  
 _The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!_  
 _Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player_  
 _That struts and frets his hour upon the stage_  
 _And then is heard no more: it is a tale_  
 _Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,_  
 _Signifying nothing."  
William Shakespeare  
Macbeth Act 5 scene 5  
_

* * *

" _It's okay, Charlie," Kate soothed as she petted the cat and stared at her sleeping husband in a way she might have called creepy once upon a time. "We made it, Charlie-boy, we're all home safe. I'm sorry I scared you. It'll be all right. It's going to be all right."_

 _She wished she could convince herself of that. Perhaps she could eventually believe it, if only she could get the dreams to stop._

* * *

Glass doors sealed off the atrium - the closest the station had to a public park - where Rick and Kate sat from the rest of Gateway Station. Unlike most of the people who sat at the benches, they weren't there for a picnic, but to meet the company rep assigned as their minder before Kate's fate was decided by a Board of Inquiry.

Both Rick and Kate wanted off the station in the worst way, both of them longing to stand under their home planet's pale yellow sun and blue skies and put their nightmarish foray into the black behind them.

A double set of glass doors that sealed the atrium off from the rest of the station parted to admit Eric Vaughn. For a moment Kate found herself regarding him as a man and not just a corporate cipher. Her appraisal of him mitigated both by the knowledge that he was _not_ her husband, and that when the _Nostromo_ had departed on its ill-fated voyage twelve years ago, he'd barely been out of college, though they were now approximately the same physical age.

"Sorry." Vaughn replied, his smile seemingly genuine, enough so that she could feel Castle stiffen at his appraisal of her. "I've been running behind this morning. Finally managed to get away."

Neither Rick nor Kate were much in the mood for small talk, especially now. They wanted to go home and get on with the business of living, especially now that their enforced quarantine prior to Kate's board of inquiry was nearly over.

"Anything about our families?" Castle asked, unable to contain himself any longer.

"I guess this is my morning for being sorry," Vaughn replied as he brought up the information requested on his tablet. "Mr Castle, I regret to inform you that your mother died eight years ago, a stroke. From the lack of hospital files it was apparently very sudden. She was cremated and interred in the Forest Lawn Repository in Manhattan. There are no records of your father, other than the reference on your birth certificate. Not even an image or a set of fingerprints, damnedest thing I have ever seen, other than a marriage certificate to a woman named Rita Hunt he doesn't seem to exist."

Kate's eyes were locked on her husband as his face fell, his mind's eye fixed on some invisible landscape of the past, blinking back tears she knew he was holding back by force of will until Vaughn left.

"I haven't been able to get a clear track on your daughter," Vaughn continued, "She changed her last name shortly after your mother's internment with privacy protocols engaged."

Castle seemed to crumple even further in on himself with the knowledge of how completely his family had fallen apart during the eight extra years they had slept the cold sleep. He looked for all the world like a lost little boy who couldn't find his mother. It tore her heart to pieces to see him so cast adrift.

'I promised Alexis we'd be home in time for her graduation from college," Castle muttered, clearly in shock, "guess we missed that one."

Vaughn nodded, trying to appear sympathetic, which was difficult for him under ordinary circumstances, at least he had the sense to keep his mouth shut instead of muttering the usual platitudes.

"You always think you can make up for being away later, you know." Castle muttered to no one in particular, "But now I know I never can."

Kate wrapped an arm around her husband sympathetically as he tried to hold himself together while Vaughn slipped a data-card into her hand. "Your father is still alive, Kate. One of the last things Castle's daughter did before she disappeared from the public record was to set him up in rehab and an independent living center, he's still there."

Kate nodded, a small smile brightening her features for a moment. ' _Dad relapsed and Alexis took care of him,_ c _ertainly sounds like her,'_ Kate thought to herself ' _she's got a big heart, just like her dad.'_

"Kate, the board of inquiry convenes at oh-eight-thirty." Vaughn mentioned quietly. "It would not look good for you to be late."

Kate nodded, and rose from her chair to stand with her husband.

Meowing, softly as if knowing how somber the occasion was, Charlie sauntered over and allowed Castle to pick him up as she wiped self-consciously at her eyes.

"We've got to change. Won't take long." Kate replied as she and Rick stroked him softly and Vaughn turned his back to them as the doors parted to permit Castle and Beckett egress from the atrium.

"You know, that cat's something of a special privilege here." the company man offered, hoping to lighten the mood and subtly show he had pull here, "They don't allow pets on Gateway."

"Charlie isn't a pet." Kate stated as if explaining to a small child while she and Rick scratched the tom behind the ears. "He's a survivor and as much a member of Nostromo's crew as we are."

* * *

As promised, both Rick and Kate were ready in plenty of time.

Eric Vaughn elected to wait outside their room, studying his reports, until the pair emerged. Though Rick cut a strong figure in his uniform recovered from the shuttle, his writer persona on full display, Kate's transformation was clearly impressive. Gone was the broken and fragile woman in hospital scrubs and flat hospital issue slippers. In her place was the completely put together warrant officer from her file photo. She was dressed immaculately in her own cleaned, pressed uniform, hair fixed in a professional low hanging pony tail standing tall in her high heeled boots. She looked not only radiant, but determined and positively formidable.

 _Determination Or just a clever front?_ Vaughn wondered to himself as they headed for the central corridor. Castle took up a position just off her left shoulder with a hand at her back, the two of them presenting a united front, a solid, unbroken line of support. For a few fleeting moments he wondered what it might be like for her to be his instead of Richard Castle's. He wasn't foolish enough to entertain the thought for long though. One of Vaughn's greatest strengths was his ability to read people and size them. He was quick to realize that any attempt to come between them would be a doomed effort.

Besides, he preferred his conquests to be a bit more compliant with a lot less baggage, not the complicated alpha female that was Kate Beckett. These two were a means to and end, a stepping stone on his way up the corporate ladder. She looked like she would be an impressive lay, but chaining himself to her would drag him back down into the corporate obscurity from which he meant to elevate himself. So he would play the role his superiors wanted him to play. The affable, friendly face of the evil Weyland-Yutani empire. He needed Kate Beckett's trust, not her body between the sheets, Though he would not turn down the opportunity to bed her if given the chance, he was well aware the price the Nostromo's executive officer had paid for that attempted transgression.

Once they set off for the conference room in the main hub, there was not a word spoken between the three of them until the elevator they'd boarded arrived at the sub-level where the hearing room was located. Kate and her husband walked with a purpose to their strides he would not have expected, considering they were facing the end of their careers. The silent communication between them an almost palpable thing.

"What are you planning to tell them?' Vaughn finally asked her, he despised being the fifth wheel and their silence had become too much for him to handle.

"You read my deposition, and Castle's. It's complete and accurate," Kate replied crisply, her command presence firmly in place. "I'm gonna tell them the truth."

"Look, Kate," Vaughn replied, "I might be willing to believe you, but the heavyweights in there, are intractable bureaucrats You got feds, Interstellar Commerce Commission, Colonial Administration, insurance company guys and every single one of them is going to try to pick holes in your story."

"I get the picture." Kate cut in, impatient for her and Castle to get this over with.

"Don't let them rattle you, don't fall into their trap," Vaughn offered, "the important thing is to stay cool and unemotional, anything less will be like blood in the water, and these guys are sharks."

 _Right,_ Kate thought to herself, _All of our shipmates are dead, Castle lost his mother and his daughter has dropped off the face of the galaxy while we were sleeping. Cool and unemotional. Sure._

* * *

Despite Kate's stubborn determination, by midday her cool and collected facade was long gone, followed by her patience. Castle's solid presence seated next to her was the only thing helping her keep it together.

The near endless repetition of the same questions, the same narrow-minded bureaucratic disputations of her account of the last voyage of the _USCSS Nostromo_ , the same aggravating blind focus on nonsensical minutiae that left the major facts she found more important untouched, combined to render her frustrated and angry. Which they seemed to pounce upon like ravenous wolves on a wounded deer.

Kate tried not to think about the large video screen behind her cycling through images and dossiers of the Nostromo and her crew. From Castle's near rigid stance in his seat, it was clear that she was not the only one glad that it was behind them. The knowledge of its very presence behind their backs rattled them enough as it was.

Neither of them wanted to look upon the faces of their Nostromo crew-mates. Banhov's resolute scowling face. Brett's placid and bored expression. Tom Richwood's smug misogynistic grin, and Angela Olivera's olive complexion and probing eyes. Ash the traitor, his soulless face and programmed placidity, which he'd maintained even as he'd tried to choke the life out of her - the memory of which made her hand drift absently to her neck. Captain Kim… whom she'd last seen right before turning her flame-thrower on the woman at her desperate request, the first time in her life she had ever committed murder.

Better the pictures were behind her, the terrible memories of those last desperate days aboard the Nostromo would likely haunt nightmare and waking hours for the rest of her life without having to see their faces. She would see them again the very next time she closed her eyes as it was.

After the third go-round, it had finally become too much for her to bear, even with Castle's calming presence by her side, a hand on her knee under the table.

"Are you people soft in the head?" she snapped. "We've been here for three hours and I've gone over this three times. How many different ways do you want me to tell the same story? You think it'll sound better in Russian? Or perhaps French? How about Latin?"

There was not a single friendly face among the entire eight member Board of Inquiry.

Executives. Administrators. Adjusters, all of them bureaucratic paper-pushers none of whom had logged a single day in space. All of their minds were firmly closed and padlocked shut with expressions of smarmy bureaucratic disapproval. Kate was used to dealing directly with the real world, ever since her introduction at age nineteen to the harsh realities of life on that cold January evening when she and her father had come home from dinner to find Detective John Raglan at their door. The intricacies of political and bureaucratic maneuvering were beyond her, which made her wonder how she'd ever even entertained the notion of a career in politics.

"This isn't as simple as you seem to believe, Officer Beckett," The chair of the inquiry board told her, his tone reminiscent of a long-suffering teacher scolding an errant schoolgirl. "Look at it from our perspective. You freely admit to detonating the engines of, and thereby destroying, a Bison Class interstellar freighter. A rather expensive piece of hardware."

The insurance investigator nodded in agreement, she was possibly the unhappiest member of the board.

"Forty-two million dollars," the woman added, "not counting payload. Engine detonation wouldn't have left anything salvageable, even if we could locate the remains after eleven years."

The board chairman nodded absently before continuing. "It's not that we think you're lying. We do believe that you believe what you're telling us. The shuttle's flight recorder does corroborate some elements of your account. The Nostromo did set down on LV-426 at the time and date specified. That repairs were made. That it lifted from the surface and resumed its course after the brief layover and was subsequently rigged for self-destruct. That the order for engine overload was provided by you. For reasons unknown."

'Look, I told you..." Kate began, but the board chairman interrupted her.

"It did not, however, contain even a single entry concerning a hostile alien life-form you allegedly picked up during your short stay on the planet's surface."

"We didn't 'pick it up', Kate shot back. "Like I told you, it..."

Kate broke off, staring at the group of faces gazing either stonily or patronizingly back at her and only then realized she was wasting her breath. This wasn't a board of inquiry, it was a witch hunt. She could explain her actions to them until she turned blue and collapsed for lack of oxygen and would never budge them. She saw that now.

Her fate had been decided before they'd set foot in the room. The inquiry was a mere formality to satisfy the record that due process was served. She decided at that moment to stop playing nice.

"Since I know for a fact that MIRA transferred all of our logs and records from the Nostromo before we abandoned ship," Kate stated angrily, going on the attack for the first time since this so-called inquiry began, "that means somebody tampered with the shuttle's memory core and doctored the files, which a competent computer tech could do in an hour. Who had access to it?"

The representative of the Extra-Solar Colonization Administration sat up in his chair and regarded her with undisguised contempt.

"Do you even hear yourself?" the man shot back at her. "Do you really expect us to believe what you've been telling us? It's clear to me that you believe it. It seems clear that your abnormally long period of hyper-sleep has messed with your head."

Castle shot from his seat for the first time, the anger in his posture clear for all to see, sending the man backpedaling away from him, his posture not-so-sure when confronted with Castle's aggressively angry six foot, broad-shouldered frame. Kate was very nearly all he had left in this world, and there was no way he would let this arrogant piece of shit talk down to her that way. He was about to take another step into the man's personal space, when Kate stilled him with a hand to his arm.

"The analytical team that went over your shuttle centimeter by centimeter and found no physical evidence of the creature you describe or anything like it." the man stated after relocating his spine, "No damage to the interior of the craft. No etching of metal surfaces that might have been caused by an unknown corrosive substance."

"That's because Castle and I blew it out the goddamn airlock!" she exclaimed.

The insurance man leaned forward and peered across the table at the ECA representative. "Are there any species like this _"hostile organism"_ native to LV-426?"

"No," The woman replied, exuding smug confidence. "It's nothing but a a rock in space. No indigenous life more complex than single celled organisms."

Kate ground her teeth as she struggled to stay calm. "I told you twice already that it wasn't indigenous to LV-426. There was a signal coming from the surface. The Nostromo's AI picked it up on sensors and woke us from hyper-sleep to investigate, as per standard regulations."

"When we arrived," Castle stated, picking up the thread from Kate and finishing the thought for her, "we found an alien spacecraft like nothing you or anyone else has ever seen. I know because I was on the survey team and saw it for myself. The ship was a derelict, after an apparent collision with the _USCSS Prometheus_ thirty years before. We homed in on one of that ship's emergency beacons. During our survey of the craft, we found an escape pod with Elizabeth Shaw aboard, her chest had been opened up from the inside and something had accessed the pod's distress beacon."

Maybe the story bothered the ECA rep. Or maybe she didn't like the united front the Castles were putting up. Whatever, she felt it was her place to respond.

"To be perfectly frank," The bureaucrat stated dismissively, "the ECA has surveyed over three hundred worlds, and none of our survey crews have ever reported the existence of such a creature, which, using your words..." she paused to find the right page on her tablet bearing their formal statements, " _gestates from a living host and has concentrated molecular acid for blood_."

Nothing Kate said had even made a dent, except to give them more ammunition to use against her. It wasn't that she had any desire to go back into space again anytime soon, but she had the sinking suspicion that her options for even a terrestrial career might be hanging from a thread. Without the corroborating evidence from the shuttle's flight recorder, Kate had nothing to offer the review board but her word, and it was abundantly clear just how little weight that carried and they were using that as a reason to label her as "unstable" and unfit for duty.

Her instincts as a detective led her to wonder who'd doctored the recorder and why. It was possible that it _could_ have malfunctioned on its own, but the disappearance of a single set of files and not the whole recorder was far too convenient given what it revealed about Weyland-Yutani's misdeeds, not that it mattered much, the deed was done and she had long since grown tired of playing their game.

"Look, I can see where this is going." Kate stated coldly expression devoid of either warmth or amusement. If they wanted to play hardball, so be it, she'd rattle their cages good and proper on her way out, even though she knew she didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting anywhere. "The whole business with the synthetic, why we were directed to the beacon in the first place – and make no mistake about it we were directed there - it all adds up, though without the information on the shuttle's computer core, you all sit there smug with the knowledge that I can't prove it."

Kate glared across the table, her eyes pausing to focus on each and every one of them, her interrogation face fully engaged, her eyes probing as if looking into each of their souls.

"Somebody's covering all this up, and as Nostromo's acting captain, I'm the obvious one to be left holding the bag. Fine, but there's one thing you can't change, one fact you can't doctor away, no matter how hard you try."

Kate glared across the table again, her shoulders set as she took charge of her life like she had them all in the box. Two of them swallowed hard at her death glare, and Castle almost felt sorry for them, having been on the receiving end once upon a time.

"Those things I described do exist. Brush me off and bury me in bullshit if you wish, but you can't wipe out the truth I'm telling you. Back on LV-426 is an alien ship with thousands of those eggs on board. Thousands. Do you understand? I suggest you send an expedition to find and deal with it _fast._ Preferably with an orbital nuke, before one of your survey ships comes back with a little surprise."

"Thank you, Officer Beckett," The board chairman began, 'that will be..."

"You don't get it, do you?" Kate shouted him down. "Just one of those things nearly wiped out my entire crew within twelve hours of bringing it aboard."

The administrator rose. He was making it clear that it wasn't just Kate who was out of patience.

"Thank you. Officer Beckett," He stated forcefully enough to have Castle up out of his seat again, "That will be all."

"That's not Goddamn all!" Kate shouted back as she rose to her feet and glared at him. "If just _one_ ofthose Goddamn things gets back here, that _will_ be all. You can just kiss everything goodbye, all of this bullshit you care so much about won't be able to save you!"

The ECA representative turned calmly to the administrator.

"I believe we have discussed this enough to come to a determination. I think it's time to close this inquest and retire for deliberation."

The Review Board Chairman nodded his assent. His mind was no more open than it had been when he'd walked into the room.

"Officer Beckett, Specialist Castle, Mr. Vaughn, if you'd excuse us, please?"

A security guard pointed politely to a door leading into an adjoining room where they could see a receptionist waiting with a tray of coffee.

Trembling with frustration, Kate turned to leave the room with Castle hard at her heels. As she turned for the door, her eyes fastened on the picture of Elise Kim that stared blankly down at her from the video-screen. Captain Kim.

Kate strode out angrily, her head held high. She knew that the result was a foregone conclusion. The so-called _"Board of Inquiry"_ would go through the motions of an honest deliberation, but it was merely a formality. The company loved formality. As long as the right boxes were checked all of the "i's" were dotted all the t's were crossed and the formalities were observed, it was okay that their predecessors had sacrificed an entire ship's crew to unleash a nightmare.

Kate didn't care that they made her the scapegoat for the entire affair. She didn't care that her career in space was all but over. She didn't care that they would paint her as unstable and unfit for further service. She could let all of that go as long as she still had Rick at her side. Nor did she care that they didn't believe her. Given the absence of any solid evidence, she could understand their resistance that much. She'd dismissed enough of Castle's half-baked conspiracy theories over the years with just as little proof.

But to ignore her story out of hand, to refuse to even check it out, even if it was just in the interest of public safety? As a former public servant who had hunted killers to make her home a safer place to live _that_ she could never forgive. These things had the potential to wipe out the entire human race and because it didn't show as a profit or a loss on their godforsaken spreadsheets, they didn't care.

"You had them eating out of your hand, kiddo." Vaughn said, not realizing the gaffe he had made until the words - Phrased exactly as Martha Rodgers would have - were out of his lips. Martha's words coming from the mouth of somebody clearly not Castle's mother nearly pushed her anger over the edge.

"Do not call me that!" Kate spat, her eyes ablaze as if to flay Vaughn alive with her gaze alone. The man had the good sense to backpedal quickly, spluttering apologies.

It was Castle's hand on her shoulder, however, that blunted her anger and took the wind from her sails. One look in the sad eyes of her husband - who had only just learned he'd lost his mother that very morning - and all of her anger dissipated like ignited flash paper. She turned to him and their foreheads met for just a moment as he held her and then the moment was gone.

"They had their minds made up before I even went in there." Kate muttered darkly as she turned back to Vaughn, "I've wasted an entire morning I could have spent consoling my husband and helping him find Alexis. Would've been easier just to recite what they wanted to hear instead of trying to convince them of the truth."

It was clear that Vaughn was still just a little afraid after Beckett's display of barely controlled rage to offer any meaningful comment.

"They think I'm a headcase, Castle." Kate whispered.

Castle paused only for a moment before changing the subject, "Have a cronut, Kate. Chocolate or buttermilk?"

She eyed the ersatz "cronuts" her husband proffered distastefully.

"You can taste the difference?" she whispered, a slight air of mischief in her tone, letting Castle know his attempt to lighten the mood had succeeded, if only just for now. Though Kate could still see the determination in his eyes to find his little girl hidden behind his glib facade.

"Not really," Castle replied, "but the colors are nice."

Kate couldn't find it within herself to grin, but she did give him the eye-roll she knew he'd been fishing for as she selected the barely identifiable chocolate one.

The _'deliberations'_ didn't take long. _Likely only long enough to have a cappuccino and comment on how to word her guilty verdict_ , Kate thought to herself as she and Castle reentered the room and took their seats.

Vaughn resumed his own seat at the far side of the chamber. He started to wink at her, thought better of it, and aborted the gesture. Kate didn't miss the moment of indecision on his part and let it go. Had she known that the man had been sent by the company to ride herd on her and monitor the proceedings she may have had a more visceral reaction to his borderline flirting.

The board chairman cleared his throat to bring the meeting back to order.

"Acting Captain Katherine Beckett, it is the finding of this board of inquiry that you acted with questionable judgment in the events leading up to destruction of the Weyland-Yutani commercial tug Nostromo and the deaths of six members of her crew. As to the charge of gross negligence and dereliction of duty, this board finds you guilty. You are hereby declared unfit to hold an ICC license as a commercial flight officer. Said license is hereby suspended indefinitely, and your employment with Weyland-Yutani is summarily terminated."

If any of them expected a reaction from the condemned, they were sorely disappointed. Kate simply sat there and stared silently back at them, shoulders rigid, tight-lipped and defiant.

The chairman continued, clearing his throat, and his conscience. "In view of the unusual length of time you and your husband have spent in hyper-sleep with possibly deleterious effects on both of your central nervous systems, no criminal or civil charges will be filed against either of you at this time."

 _At this time_ , Castle thought humorlessly to himself as they dismissed the woman he loved like she was nothing, which infuriated him beyond words, _Corporate speak for 'Keep your mouth shut, stay away from the media and maybe you'll still be allowed to collect your back pay and pension.'_

"You are hereby released on your own recognizance pending a six-month period of probation, to include monthly review by an approved ICC psychiatrist for treatment and/or medication as may be prescribed. This board of inquiry now stands adjourned."

Castle's eyes smoldered at the arrogant bastard who'd down the very same punishment that had been intended for Tom Richwood for what he had done to Kate. His hands flexed under the table with only barely controlled rage. He wanted to hit something, preferably the smug corporate bastard who thought this was a novel way to show Kate who's boss.

Kate sat at the table and spoke not a word as the board chairman gathered up his flimsies, closed his briefcase and turned to leave the room. She rose from her seat, determined to try one more time to get through to him.

Vaughn saw the look in her eye and moved to stop her as she followed him out, Castle following close behind, he stepped into her path and grasped her elbow to keep her in the room. Castle bristled at his invasion of his wife's personal space, straightening his spine and coming to his full, imposing height, making his displeasure quite clear.

"Beckett, please, let it go," Vaughn whispered to her, "it's over."

Kate shrugged out of Vaughn's loose grasp and continued up the corridor, the threatening look from Richard Castle rooting him to the spot and caught up with the man as he stood waiting for the elevator.

"Why won't you at least check out LV-426?" Kate asked.

He glanced back at her.

"Ms. Beckett," he replied, his tone almost patronizing, "the decision of the board is final."

"This isn't about the board's decision," Kate shot back, her tone almost beseeching, "It's not about me, but the next people who find that ship. Why you won't you at least check it out."

"Because I don't have to," he told her brusquely. "The people who live there mapped every square centimeter of the surface three years ago and reported nothing about a _"hostile organism"_ nor even any mention an alien ship. Do you think I'm a complete fool? Did you think the board wouldn't seek some sort of verification, if only to protect ourselves from future liability?"

Kate was struck dumb from what the man had said.

"What are you talking about?" Castle asked, picking up Kate's line of inquiry when the words were trapped in her throat as always, "What people?'

The Company suit stepped into the elevator car and turned back to face them again, but Kate thrust an arm between the doors to keep them from closing, it's sensors obediently waited for her to remove it.

"Terraformers," the man explained. "We've made significant advances in colony development while the two of you were sleeping. LV-426 is what we call a shake-'n'-bake colony. We set up atmosphere processors to make the air breathable as long as there is at least some sort of gaseous atmosphere to work with. Hydrogen or argon works to kick-start the process, but methane gives the best results."

Kate was still a little gobsmacked as the man continued giving his recitation on colonial development from memory, a subject he was obviously much more upbeat about.

"LV-426 was practically swimming in methane, along with just enough trace amounts of oxygen, nitrogen and carbon dioxide to move things along. By now, phase one should be complete and they've long since begun phase two, the introduction of oxygen producing plants and lichen. As we speak, LV426's capacity to to support terrestrial life should be increasing exponentially and will be completely habitable and ready for full scale colonization within the next ten years. Once the mineral deposits are played out, LV-426 could find new life as an emergency repair depot given it's position near the midway point between Earth and Thedus in the frontier."

Kate's hand did not waver in the door, and she studiously ignored the other passengers' annoyance.

"How many colonists?" she asked.

His brow furrowed as he tallied the figures in his head. "At last count, sixty, maybe seventy families."

"Oh, my god," Kate and Rick whispered in unison, the same nightmare scenario playing out in both of their heads.

Kate dropped her arm to her side and let the elevator doors close on the company suit. Turning her thoughts instead to the colony on LV-426, horrified by what her mind's eye showed her. She knew there was a potential tragedy brewing for the three hundred plus people on that small dust-covered planetoid as certainly as if an oracle of Delphi had risen from the deck plates and pronounced their doom.

She'd tried to warn them, but they wouldn't listen. There wasn't a damn thing she could do about it, not without going back out into the black, and she didn't think she was ready to face the darkness and monsters she knew were waiting there.

 _How the hell can I save anyone?_ Kate thought to herself accusingly, _I can't even get a decent night's sleep without waking up screaming._

* * *

The commercial shuttle ride to Earth's surface had been uneventful, a much less bumpy planet-fall than the one they had made to the surface of LV-426. Kate had kept the window open so she could see the sunlight and blue sky once suborbital insertion had given way to entry into full atmo.

It hadn't seemed real until the ship's landing struts kissed the landing pad, the Captain had announced their arrival at JFK international and the flight attendants had begun to herd them toward the exit. Neither of them had much with them. Most of their personal effects had been lost with the Nostromo and they literally had nothing but Charlie in his cat-box, the uniforms on their backs, back pay credit chits for twelve years and a small bag of toiletries each to carry along on the short flight.

Castle called Black Pawn publishing and then his publicist Paula Haas and they were rather pleasantly surprised at how little convincing he'd had to do to convince them that the reports of his death had been greatly exaggerated. Within minutes a town car had been sent to pick them up and deliver them home.

Another pleasant surprise awaited them when the car dropped them at 495 Broome Street. Though Eduardo – who had quite a few more gray hairs on his head – looked at them like he'd seen a ghost the loft was still registered in his name, and the front door still responded to their biometrics.

No sooner had the front door closed behind them, than Kate had stooped to open the box to release Charlie from his confinement. Charlie took off like his tail was on fire, their last sighting of him, a flash of orange streaking up the stairs.

For the next two hours, the two set themselves to the task of setting up the house for habitation again. Covers were removed from furniture, and takeout was ordered for the night.

A conversation with "Lucy" the loft's virtual intelligence, Castle had been able to determine that Alexis had set up Rick's Black Pawn royalties into paying for the loft and associated fees required. It was clear that she intended to return as soon as her stint in colony development was over. They even had her new name, Alexis Rodgers, and the name of the terraforming colony she had left earth to join.

Archeron.

* * *

For the next six weeks, life for Castle and Beckett fell into a mostly comfortable routine. They attended their mandatory counseling sessions, took the medication prescribed for their overly long dose of hyper-sleep and each endured the nightmares they both had of their last trip into space. Both of them awakening from sound sleep either screaming the other's name. Clinging to each other and tumbling into panic driven sex to reassure each of them of the other's continued existence.

Sometimes when Kate couldn't sleep, she would hear her husband whisper his daughter's name in his sleep, see his shoulders shudder. They had sent a message to Archeron colony to let her know they were alive, but it was sufficiently far away that their message would not be arriving for another week. Though both of them felt s inking feeling where Archeron was, they avoided looking too closely. Not that they didn't want to look, but confirmation would crush them both.

Until the knock at their door that they had been dreading since they learned of the colony on LV-426 finally came.

When Kate opened the door, Eric Vaughn stood in the doorway, with a colonial Marine in his undress khakis standing right behind him at parade rest.

"What do you want, Vaughn?" Castle asked brusquely, "he had never liked the man, never liked the way he looked at Kate as if she was a piece of meat."

Kate stilled him with a glance before inviting Vaughn and the marine who's name pin identified him as Lt, Gorman of the United Earth Colonial Marine Corps, inside.

After the usual niceties had been observed, which Rick knew was Kate's way of delaying the inevitable she was unprepared to deal with. Vaughn finally spoke, his words dropping the bottom out of both of their worlds.

"We've lost contact with the colony on Archeron."

* * *

 ** _**Author's note** Yes, I admit it, I am hiding from what is going on with the show and hoping it isn't gonna go on on much longer. This story will also serve as my escape from that reality. My opinion on the current arc can be found on both twitter and tumbler under the same name I use here, so please don't bring it with you into further reviews. Fanfic is my escape valve and I really don't want to discuss it here so I will ignore you. Thank you for your cooperation._**


	3. Communications Breakdown

**Chapter Three  
Communications Breakdown**

* * *

 _After the usual niceties had been observed, which Rick knew was Kate's way of delaying the inevitable she was unprepared to deal with. Vaughn finally spoke, his words dropping the bottom out of both of their worlds._

" _We've lost contact with the colony on Archeron."_

* * *

Before Kate could recover from the shock of that unexpected statement, Castle was in motion. His right fist snaked out without warning, catching the company man in the jaw and dropping him to the floor.

"My daughter is on Archeron, you son of a bitch!" he shouted as Gorman swung into action and dragged him bodily away from the company exec on the floor, Castle fought him the whole way.

"Get up," Castle shouted,

It took several long minutes for Kate to get her husband to stand down, so they could hear what the company rep had to say.

"What's with the Marine escort, Eric?" Kate asked, feeling Castle tense at her use of his first name, instead of a more formal title. Castle knew that Kate had been required to meet with him once a week to prove that she was in compliance with the company guidelines to keep out of the public eye. He knew that just because they were on a first name basis didn't mean they were friends. He knew that Kate was hoping that by playing nice with their pet company rep that they could get the company to do something about the alien ship.

It was through these meetings that Kate had learned that LV-426 and Archeron - the terraforming colony Alexis had signed on with - were one and the same. Knowledge that had weighed them both down with a growing sense of dread. It was after that discovery that Rick had sent a priority message to Archeron begging Alexis to come home. They still hadn't received more than the "message received" burst from their first message.

"Ma'am I'm here as an official representative of the Colonial Marine Corps."

It was clear after her husband's initial violent display, that Gorman was clearly uneasy about their visit and more than willing to let Vaughn handle the bulk of the conversation. She wondered what he'd been told about them, not that his opinion mattered to her, but she sent Castle to the kitchen to make more coffee and cool off while she pressed Vaughn for more information.

"So you've lost contact," Kate stated, once Castle was out of earshot, feigning indifference as she handed Vaughn an ice pack for the bruise beginning to bloom on his face. "And?"

Vaughn shifted the ice pack to his left hand as he opened his slim briefcase.

"All communications are down, and for too long to chalk up to equipment failure." Vaughn said "Families of the colonists are up in arms all over the extra-net, the ECA people are getting nervous, especially after what you said at your inquiry board. We need to show we're doing something, This is where you come in."

"You mean Castle and me?" Kate asked.

"No, Kate, just you." Vaughn replied.

It wasn't what his bosses told him, but he'd made a unilateral decision to try to get Kate to come alone. From his conversations with her over the last few weeks he was sure he would have much better luck keeping her under control if he could convince her that her husband should stay behind.

While Gorman sipped his coffee and Vaughn waited, Kate began pacing.

"No," she said finally. "There's no way."

"Hear me out, Kate," Vaughn sputtered, not expecting such determination. "It's not what you think."

Kate stopped in the middle of the floor and stared at him.

"Not what I think?" Kate hissed, "Not what I think? Eric. I was fed to the wolves by the company and now you want me to go back out there alone with you?"

Kate was trembling as she spoke, a mix of anger and panic. She was scared out of her mind and trying to mask it with indignation. Vaughn pressed on, anyway. He knew it was his only chance to control the situation.

"Kate," he began, in his best conciliatory manner, "we don't know what's going on out there. It could be nothing, their relay satellite could be out instead of the ground transmitter. If that's the case, the relief team won't even have to set foot on the planet. If it's not the orbital relay, but one of those things, I'll only need one of you there in an advisory capacity."

Gorman lowered his coffee and decided to weigh in.

"You wouldn't be going in with the troops, Ms. Beckett," he offered. "Assuming we have to drop in. I'll have two heavy fire teams of Marines on the ready line to guarantee your safety."

Kate rolled her eyes and glanced at the ceiling.

"Kate, these won't be rent-a-cops or mercenaries accompanying us," Vaughn offered. "but half a platoon of Colonial Marines, packing state-of-the-art firepower. There's nothing they can't handle. Right, Lieutenant?"

Gorman allowed himself a smile. "My Marines are trained to deal with the unexpected. The Colonial Marine Corps has handled problems in much worse environments than Acheron. My unit's success rate for this kind of operation is high. I expect to improve that after this visit."

If Gorman thought his declaration was going to impress Kate, he failed miserably. She looked back to Vaughn.

"What about you?" She asked, "What's your interest in this?"

"Weyland-Yutani co-financed the colony with the Extrasolar Colonial Administration." he explained, "We're diversifying, getting into a lot of terraforming. Real estate on a galactic scale. Building better worlds and all that."

"Yeah," Kate muttered. "I've seen the vids."

"The corporation won't see any substantial profits from Acheron until terraforming is completed, so it's in our best interests to protect that investment in people and materiel."

Vaughn decided to go for the jugular to try to win her over before Castle returned from the kitchen.

"I hear you're having trouble finding meaningful employment since your termination."

"What about it?" Kate replied, Her reply was defensive, as was to be expected.

"What if I said I could get you reinstated as a flight officer?" Vaughn added "Get you your license back? The official reprimand comes out of your record without a trace. As far as anyone will be concerned, you've been on a medical leave of absence. Perfectly normal following a long tour of duty. I know you want to do the right thing for those colonists, make certain they are safe, especially Castle's daughter."

"If I go alone with you," Kate replied.

"If you go." Vaughn confirmed. He could tell by the look in her eyes and the expression on her face that she was mulling it over. What he hadn't counted upon was that her husband was a lot quieter than even Kate had realized.

"Get out." Castle stated dangerously. His eyes boring straight into the company rep. "Get the fuck out of our house!"

The two men exchanged a look. Gorman's expression was unreadable, Vaughn fished a translucent business card from his pocket and placed it on the table before heading for the door and paused in the doorway to smile back at her.

"Think about it, Kate," He said, just before Castle slammed the door in his face.

* * *

Castle and Beckett argued back and forth about Vaughn's offer and request that she convince him to remain behind - which she did try - but to no avail. It was clear though, even to Castle that her heart really wasn't in it. She was only going through the motions, because as much as she really didn't want to go out there, she new she could not walk away and leave the colonists to their fate. Vaughn was right, it wasn't in her nature.

In the end they decided to sleep on it and make a decision in the morning. Kate slipped Vaughn's card into the nightstand and slipped into bed with Castle.

At one thirty in the morning Kate woke from one of the most powerful nightmares she had experienced yet, she lay panting, drenched in sweat, hearts pounding and came to a decision. She inserted the card Vaughn gave her into a slot in the bedside console to call Vaughn.

The video-screen that dominated the far wall immediately flashed the words STAND BY before Vaughn's face appeared, bleary-eyed and unshaven, clearly having been roused from a sound sleep.

"Hello? Oh, Kate. Hi." he mumbled.

"Vaughn, just tell me one thing," Kate asked, "You're going out there to kill them. Not to study them or bring one back. We'll be going there to burn them out once and for all."

 _That got his attention_ , she noted.

"That's the plan, he replied, "We find anything lethal, anything at all, we fry it. My word on it."

"All right. I'm in." Kate replied, "on one condition."

"What is it?" Vaughn replied, the first vestiges of a smile on his lips.

"Castle comes with me, or the deal is off," Kate stated firmly, her tone brooking no argument "his daughter is out there, and if you think I'm gonna even try to get between him and finding her, then you don't know me very well."

Kate pulled the card out of the slot, cutting off the line before he could reply or try to changer her mind. If she was going, she needed her partner. She needed somebody on this mission she could trust implicitly to lean on, and if Vaughn had thought that person would be him, then he was very sorely mistaken. Neither she, nor Castle were going to be whole until they faced this thing, until it was done.

Kate's gaze slid down to her poorly sleeping husband, then fondly down at Charlie, curled at his hip as if standing guard. The regal looking Tomcat gazed up on her with a seemingly puzzled expression. She trailed her short nails down his spine, and he primped delightedly, rubbing against her hand and purring.

"And you, Charlie-boy," she whispered as she stroked his fur and scratched his ears, "you little shit, are staying here."

Her father had always been more of a dog person, but she was sure he'd take good care of Charlie while she and Castle returned to LV-426 to face their demons.

It was time to pack a bag.


	4. Sulaco

**Chapter Four  
Sulaco**

 _"This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.  
My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life." _

From "The Creed of the United States Marine"  
by Major General William H. Rupertus USMC

* * *

A ship passed through the blackness of space on course to Archeron. A mountain of metal, composites and ceramic painted black as the space she navigated, shouldered its way brutally through hyperspace. This was no ordinary transport vessel or supply ship, but a heavily armed and armored troop Military fast deployment vessel. She was a pure expression of military might and firepower from her armored bow, her dorsal and ventral weapon hard-points to her overpowered stellar drive engines. This was not a casual visit by a transport like the Nostromo. Her crew and Colonial Marine complement unprepared for the nightmare they were charging headlong toward.

Her name was UNSS Sulaco.

The Sulaco floated off the ways at Olympus Mons Naval Shipyard almost twenty-five years ago. She was named for a pivotal figure in one of the worst naval space disasters in Terran Military history.

 _Thirty years before, the UNSS Thresher had been on a training cruise near Pluto when one of her drop-ships crashed on the flight deck and accidentally discharged its port side missile battery into the deck, violently opening the engine room to space._

 _When the emergency systems went offline and number two fusion reactor failed to SCRAM, the only surviving member of Thresher's engineering staff, Engineer's Mate 2nd Class Karen Sulaco manually sealed the emergency door and refused to abandon her post._

 _For six hours, the petite blonde engineer's mate from Albany, NY fought alone in the dark to keep the damaged reactor from reaching critical mass, buying time for her shipmates to abandon the terminally crippled Thresher and reach minimum safe distance. EM2C Karen Sulaco's last words over the comm before she finally succumbed to radiation exposure had been a plea to the captain to tell her children she loved them. Communications were not severed until she flat-lined so she would not die alone._

 _Thresher's AI discharged the ship's remaining ordinance and crashed her onto the frozen surface of Pluto, where the UNSS Thresher remains to this day. Her toxic, irradiated hull the final resting place for twelve United Earth sailors and twenty-one Colonial Marines._

 _For her sacrifice, above and beyond the call of duty, Engineer's Mate Second Class Karen Sulaco was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart and the Silver Star._

 _When the next generation of rapid troop deployment vessels went into production five years later, the first hull off the line was named in her honor. UNSS Sulaco has served with distinction ever since, her battered armor and unbroken hull, a testament to her namesake's unwavering dedication to duty. When her eldest son, Lt. Cmdr David Sulaco took over as chief engineer ten years ago - the post he holds to this day - the officer he'd relieved (who had served with his mother briefly) told him:_

 _"She's a tough old lady, Mister Sulaco, but not nearly so tough as the lady she's named for."_

* * *

Thirty-five souls slept the cold sleep within Sulaco's hull.

Fourteen Colonial Marines, -barely half the complement she was designed to deploy- for whom the cold sleep was merely a momentary peace before deployment dirt-side, the ship's ten member crew, three civilians, one of whom heavily sedated to mute the effects of recurring nightmares. All being watched over by a synthetic for whom sleep would have been a pointless waste of his time.

Executive Officer Bishop spent the three weeks of quiet monitoring readouts and adjusting controls on various stations throughout the ship, though his most important duties centered around the health and well being of the sleeping humans entrusted to his care. They were now less than three days out from their drop zone, however and his quiet vigil had come to an end.

Sulaco's AI - referred to by her crew as _Mother -_ powered up the internal systems throughout the massive military transport. Long dormant machinery came back to life, as did the hyper-sleep capsules bearing their precious human cargo which one-by-one cycled open. Satisfied that his charges were well on their way to awakening from their hibernation, Bishop set about his other shipboard duties and prepared to be relieved by the human crew. As much as he enjoyed the quiet of these long haul trips, he was looking forward to the reduction in his workload.

* * *

Castle and Beckett were the first of the sleepers to awaken and emerge. Bishop had been informed about the incident with their executive officer and had been directed by Vaughn, Eric J to cycle their pods first to allow the husband and wife some privacy from the prying eyes of the Marines who had actually cycled into their pods before the civilians arrived.

The husband and wife emerged from the pods and began their routine, neither of them commenting on the fact that the last time they had done this had been on the Nostromo. They silently helped each other clear away the hyper-sleep fluid from their bodies, showered and were mostly dressed by the time the other pods began to cycle open. Their eyes and movements conveying more in that quiet moments they shared than any words that might have been said. " _I love you"_ " _I'm sorry"_ and " _I forgive you"_ conveyed in every touch and glance between them for the argument they'd had leading up to Castle's sudden inclusion on the mission.

* * *

Vaughn sat up in his chamber, noting theirs were empty and allowing only a moment for his displeasure with the current situation to register on his face before his cooler more placid demeanor once again descended.

He hadn't wanted Beckett's husband on this trip. It wasn't that he had designs on Kate Beckett's body, at least not in the traditional sense, but he wanted her here alone, off-balance and open to manipulation, so he could control her and the situation. With the two of them presenting a united front and an agenda of their own, his personal goals on Archeron were going to be that much more difficult to carry out.

* * *

The other capsules containing the Sulaco's command crew and military complement began to cycle and pop open. The Marines and Navy crew were quick to wake, they had trained for this. They knew they would have three days to shake off the sluggishness brought on by the cold sleep and get tactical.

The first Marine out of the tubes was Master Sergeant John Apone. He'd been a Marine for nearly thirty-five years - most of it spent in and out of hyper-sleep - on vessels not much different than this one. He'd been an arrogant, overconfident private first class, well on on his way to a dishonorable discharge for conduct unbecoming when he'd ended up in unit of hard-luck cases under the command Sergeant Major Elise Kim. She'd turned him around, busted his ass and remade him into a proper Marine, now on the short list to be Sergeant Major of the Corps.

When the mission brief was offered to him, he hadn't thought twice about accepting it, if only to see for himself what had brought down the woman who'd forged him into the weapon he'd become. He owed her that much.

Apone marched up and down the the row of freezers where his Marines were coming out of hyper-sleep, dressed only in a pair of boxers with an unlit cigar in his teeth as if he was on the parade ground in full battle dress. These were _HIS_ Marines, no matter what that young kid with the lieutenant's bars thought. He'd salute, follow orders and say _"yes sir,"_ to the man, that was the covenant all Marines accepted upon induction, but in the end every enlisted man and woman in that room was _his_ responsibility. Their souls may belong to Jesus, Yahweh, Allah, or whatever god they prayed to, but as long as they lived, their _asses_ belonged to _his_ beloved Corps.

PFC Spunkmeyer the drop-ship crew chief rubbed at his eyes and groaned as he blinked in the hyper-sleep chamber.

'I'm getting too old for this.' He complained.

No one paid any attention, it wasn't a new complaint, most of them had made it at one time or another. Such griping was part and parcel of military life from time immemorial.

Private Drake rolled out of his capsule next. He was a little older than Spunkmeyer and a lot uglier. As the smart-gun operator for first squad, Drake was heavy-duty bad company, a lifer practically built for combat, skilled in the use of rifles, handguns, grenades, assorted blades, and his teeth.

"They ain't payin' us enough for this," Drake mumbled.

"Certainly not enough to have to wake up to your face, Drake." Added Corporal Dietrich, their medic, who was arguably the prettiest of the group except when she opened her mouth.

"Fuck you," Drake told her and eyed the occupant of another recently opened capsule.

'Hey, Espo, you look like I feel."

Gunnery Sergeant Javier Esposito was second in command among the troops after Master Sergeant Apone, commanding second squad in combat He didn't talk much, kept his counsel to himself while the others spouted off. He had only just received his chevrons and would be moving up to Master Sergeant when Apone left.

He'd mustered out of the Corps for a while to be a cop once upon a time, but few who knew him now could get him to open up about it, even with liberal amounts of alcohol. They all assumed something bad must have befallen him out in the world to bring him back to the Corps. Only their token squid Bosun's Mate 1st Ryan seemed to be able to pry that information out of him and he wasn't very chatty about it either, after a while they just let it go and respected that he had his reasons.

"Another glorious day in the Corps!" Master Sergeant Apone barked on his third trip up the center aisle. "Every meal a banquet! Every paycheck a fortune!" As he passed Corporal Hudson.

"This floor's freezing." Hudson complained.

"Christ. I never saw such a buncha old women." Apone growled. "You want me to fetch your slippers for you, Hudson?"

Hudson gave Apone his best puppy-dog pout, the kind that had really only ever worked on his mother, "Would you, sir? I'd be ever so grateful!"

"Look me in my eye," Apone replied gruffly as he yanked the man out of the tube and onto his feet to the accompaniment of rough laughter from the grunts of both squads.

"Move it Marines, get your asses in the showers," Apone bellowed, "Breakfast in the main mess by 08:30 followed by PT and then drill. We have a special assembly at..."

Apone paused and looked at Bishop, who shrugged then checked his tablet, "Our course will intercept the coordinates you specified at seventeen-thirty hours, Master Sergeant Apone."

"...seventeen hundred hours for an Honors Detail in battle dress."

No matter what their personal feelings feelings or associations, every Marine's head snapped around at the mention of _"Honors Detail"_ , each of their heads bowed low for a fraction of a second, before the jumble of activity began anew.

* * *

Castle and Beckett did their best to stay out of the way as Apone motivated his Marines up out of their tubes and moved past them to the door to where their lockers awaited. The two of them had already been up and and dressed together in private, thankful that the ship's captain, Lt. Cmdr Olivia Gates had arranged for them to have a moment of privacy to get themselves settled before the troops swept through.

The Marines were a rough. tightly knit bunch, but after her experience with Richwood, he knew Kate really didn't need to be ogled after coming out of hyper-sleep. They had both been through quite enough since then and Castle was grateful for her consideration.

PFC Vasquez stared, looking Kate up and down as she walked past. Kate hadn't been that harshly appraised since Victoria Gates had suspended her and Espo for going after Maddox alone. After looking Kate over and obviously finding her wanting, Vasquez snorted and shouldered past her and Castle without a word.

"Hey, Vasquez, you ever been mistaken for a man?" Hudson quipped, as the Latina swept past his locker to find her own.

"No. Have you?" Vasquez replied, It seemed to Kate that she had little use for Hudson, either.

Drake proffered an open palm, which Vasquez slapped with gusto, not flinching as his fingers clenched tightly around her smaller ones. Their handclasp grew tighter, almost painful before she whacked him across the chest and their hands parted. It was clear that the two shared a deep bond that went beyond family, beyond blood. The unit's smart-gun operators were a matched brace of deadly weapons, young and eager to prove their skill either in combat or the training circle.

Kate could tell that when the shit hit the fan, the safest place would be behind and between them. Kate resolved that she would do her best to keep Castle there if at all possible.

* * *

Bishop moved quietly among the group with a fluid grace and quiet understated patience that did not seem to fit the activity in the room, his bearing more like a valet than a ship's officer. He appeared older than any of the troopers, including Lieutenant Gorman, yet he carried himself with a bearing that was clearly subordinate to the others, even the lowliest private.

Kate wondered to herself how he had roused so quickly after hyper-sleep without either of them noticing. She and Castle had been first out, or so she'd thought and even now they both felt sluggish, yet Bishop seemed to be operating without difficulty.

Bishop brushed past Castle with a whispered apology, revealing a tattoo on his wrist to the writer. Barely poking below the cuff of his sleeve, it bore a number and part of a barcode which he didn't recognize. Castle didn't think anything of it, he'd certainly seen stranger tattoos.

* * *

"Beckett? Castle?" came a voice that neither Kate nor Rick had heard in years, "Espo, you have to see this!"

Kate whirled, her face opening in an expression of pure joy Castle hadn't seen in weeks when she saw the source of the voice.

"Ryan?" Kate asked shortly before enveloping the barely dressed Irishman into a crushing hug.

"Beckett, we thought you were dead!" Esposito stated gruffly before Kate released the stunned Ryan to hug Esposito too, "both of you!"

"Rumors of our deaths were very greatly exaggerated," Castle quipped as he shared a more manly hug with Ryan and a handclasp with Esposito. He'd been trying for humor, but there was too much emotion choking his voice.

"How did you two get roped into this?" Ryan asked, but it was clear from both of their expressions that neither Rick nor Kate were anxious to talk about it. Castle's expression darkened, a shadow that even Ryan noticed.

"We ran into something out this way ten years ago...it was bad." Kate whispered, "The rest will be in your briefing. But the worst part is... Alexis is down there where we're going."

"Don't worry, bro," Esposito said gruffly to Castle, "we may not have always seen eye-to-eye, we'll be sure to look out for Little Castle."

* * *

Through the swirling steam of the showers Hudson, Vasquez, and Ferro nodded at Castle and Beckett as they chatted with Esposito and Ryan.

"Who's Snow White and Prince Charming?" Vasquez asked as she washed the hyper-sleep fluid out of her hair. "Ryan and Sgt. Espo sure seemed happy to see em."

"Some kinda consultants." Hudson remarked. " Don't know much else."

"Heard they saw an alien once." Ferro, the diminutive drop-ship pilot added with exaggerated deference as she wiped at her belly, which was as flat and muscular as a steel plate.

"Ooooh" Hudson mocked, pretending to shake with excitement, "I'm soooo impressed."

"Let's go, let's go," Apone yelled back at them from the drying room, toweling off, "cycle through and cut the chatter. We'll be briefed when we need to know. You gotta get dirty before you get clean."

* * *

Informal segregation was the order of the day in the mess room, with little need for ceremony or prompting. Apone and his troopers, along with the ship's ratings not standing their watches gathered at the large table while Castle, Beckett, Vaughn Gorman, and Captain Gates sat at the other.

'Sar-major," Corporal Hudson, Apone's second for first squad piped up "what's the op?"

"Rescue mission." Apone stated loudly with a grin as he sipped his coffee. "There's some juicy colonists' daughters we gotta rescue from virginity."

Apone didn't notice Castle's sharp angry glare at his back from across the room. _My daughter is out there asshole_ broadcasting loud and clear in his expression, which only Kate could read. Kate placated her husband as best she could under the circumstances.

Kate was well aware she still had some major fence mending of her own to do, arising from her attempt with Vaughn to get him to stay home. Which, when he found out about it, had sparked one of their worst arguments in years.

Alexis was on Archeron, possibly in danger from the very thing both of them still had nightmares about, there wasn't a chance in hell she was ever going to get him to stay behind, which she would have understood had she not been so clearly manipulated by Vaughn, something she still wasn't aware of. Whatever lingering issues they might have would be settled when Alexis was safely home with them.

"Hell, that lets me out." Ferro muttered, looking disappointed.

"Says who?" Hudson muttered as he leered at her, and she threw a spork at him.

"I like _men_ just fine," Ferro shot back, "If you _were_ one, I _might_ be interested."

"Shee-it. Dumb-ass colonists," Spunkmeyer muttered as he sat down with his plate, "What's this crap supposed to be?"

After three weeks asleep he was starving, but not so starving not to gripe about how crappy the food was.

"Corn bread, I think," Wierzbowski fingered his portion and added absently.

"Looks like the new LT's too good to eat with us grunts." Vasquez added with contempt, "Seems more interested in kissing up to that company pendejo."

Wierzbowski stared past Vasquez and nodded.

"I sure hope this one at least knows his job," growled Crowe.

"We'll find out," Frost muttered as he hacked at his eggs. "Apone will either sort his ass out, or we'll work around him while he does his thirteen months and get kicked out or upstairs like the rest."

Ryan and Esposito ignored most of the conversation going on, too intent upon watching Beckett. She hadn't appeared to have aged much, but it was clear that she wasn't the Kate Beckett that had left the NYPD fifteen years ago for a career in space. She looked gaunt and haunted, and it was clear that Castle wasn't doing much better.

It was apparent that - regardless of what was going on at their destination – Little Castle was the only thing that had brought them back out into space. The two former cops didn't need to speak a word between them to share their resolve to keep an eye out for the pair.

They had caught on earlier to Hudson taking a more than casual interest in Beckett. He had been smart enough to keep his moth shut with the ship's officers in the room, but they knew that look - hell every female on board knew that look - and it was clear that Kate was in no shape to deal with Hudson's roving eye and wandering hands. While the two of them tried to figure out a way to warn him to leave Beckett alone the man created the very opportunity himself when Bishop made another pass down the table.

"Hey Bishop!" Hudson called out, waving a combat knife in its scabbard, "Do that thing with the knife, please?"

Bishop tried to defer, stating his duties, it was clear that the ship's synthetic didn't like to show off, but the others joined in, until Bishop finally relented and took the knife, slipping it clear of the scabbard and flipping it in his hand to gauge its balance. Ryan felt a little bad, because he rather liked Bishop, but maybe he and Espo could kill two birds with one stone.

Espo slid in behind Hudson just as Bishop laid his hand flat on the table to begin. Ryan waved Bishop aside and Espo forced Hudson's hand to the table - keeping him still with an arm around his neck - and nodded to Bishop with a wink.

"Hey man, what are you doing?" Hudson whined, "Espo come on...Bishop hey man..."

Bishop spread his fingers over Hudson's and looked the corporal in the eye.

"Please, Corporal," Bishop whispered, "don't move."

"Hey!" Hudson complained, no longer enjoying the game when it was his hand on the table, "Not me man!"

"Trust me," Bishop whispered as began tapping the table between their splayed fingers with the knife... slowly at first, then faster and faster until the knife was a blur and the staccato of the point hitting the table was lost behind Hudson's long drawn out howl.

After a moment or two Bishop slowed, the knife only missing the mark once, but he'd caught it with the heel of his own hand, to shield Hudson's from harm, the white liquid seeping from the cut as he returned the blade to him.

"Not funny, man," Hudson complained, but Esposito was hardly sympathetic.

"Leave Beckett alone, or Ryan and I won't be nearly as gentle as Bishop." Espo hissed, the point clearly made.

"Oh and you should lay off Bishop too," Ryan added, feeling more than a little guilty for using the ship's synthetic to make their point, "you know he can't fight back, and nobody likes a bully."

Nobody realized that Kate had been watching the display, her eyes wide with horror as they locked on the milky white fluid leaking from Bishop's hand. White fluid she had seen only once before... _Ash_. Her mind flying back his hands around her throat... the sickening crunch Rick's head had made when Ash smashed it into the door-frame of Nostromo's mess hall. Her vision began to tunnel as she fought to breathe.

It took several minutes of breathing exercises and Castle whispering softly in her ear to slowly bring her back to the moment.

* * *

After cleaning himself up and retrieving another food tray from the auto-chef, Bishop took the empty seat next to Kate who immediately jumped up and moved next to Castle to put the table between them. Bishop looked almost wounded by her prejudice.

"I apologize, Ms. Beckett," Bishop stated quietly, hoping to defuse the situation, "If I have done something to offend you please tell me, so I might correct the error."

Kate pointedly ignored him and glared at Vaughn.

"What the hell, Vaughn?" Kate hissed across the table, her tone accusing. "You never said anything about an android on board! Don't lie to me, I saw him bleed after that little knife display."

"I'm sorry, Kate, it never even occurred to me," Vaughn replied, "It's been standard procedure to have a synthetic on deep space missions for nearly a decade. They don't require hyper-sleep, and it's a lot cheaper than training a human pilot to oversee the longer interstellar jumps."

"I prefer the term _"artificial person"_ myself," Bishop interjected gently. "Is there a problem? Perhaps it's something I can help with."

"I don't think so." Vaughn replied, trying not to sound condescending to either Kate or Bishop. "A syn... an artificial person... malfunctioned on her last trip out. Some deaths were involved."

"Malfunctioned, my ass," Kate spat, "The damn thing let the xenomorph run loose on the ship, actively worked against us to keep it alive, before trying to kill me, and came damn close to killing Castle!"

"I'm shocked." Bishop replied, his expression one of concern, "Was it long ago?"

"A little over ten years," Vaughn replied without going into specifics.

"Must have been an older model, then." Bishop noted.

"Hyperdine Systems 120-A/2." Vaughn stated

"Well, that explains it," Bishop stated turning to Kate, trying to sound reassuring. "The A/2s were always a bit twitchy, not to mention their inhibitors were far too easily tampered with overridden or damaged, there were multiple incidents so they never went into full production."

Bishop waited a moment for Castle and Beckett to digest what he'd said, and at Rick's nod, he continued,

"I can assure you Ms Beckett, with my third generation behavioral inhibitors it is _impossible_ for me to harm or by omission of action, allow to be harmed any human being. Those inhibitors are hard-wired into all of my higher cerebral functions. Unlike the 120-A/2's mine cannot be tampered with or overridden without burning out all of my higher processes and rendering me inert. I'm quite harmless."

Without further comment, he offered her the plate of cornbread in his hand,. "Would you like some more cornbread?"

Kate slapped the plate away, and it tumbled to the floor, sending cornbread everywhere.

"Just stay away from me, Bishop!" Kate hissed, "and my husband! You got that straight? You keep the hell away from us!"

Kate's outburst sparked no more conversation as the troopers finished breakfast and filed out for morning PT. Hudson was careful not to comment on it, Ryan and Esposito had made their point. Kate Beckett was off-limits.

* * *

After what happened at breakfast, it was clear to Castle that Kate needed to walk this off. Captain Gates had been kind enough to offer the exercise track that ran the length of the ship. It was a relatively long walk, and the exercise had done wonders for her, allowing her to get her breathing, and by extension her body back under her control.

The Marines had passed them in formation only once on their walk. The fourteen men and women jogging in lockstep. Private Drake called out the cadence as the formation split seamlessly to move past them on either side, flowing by them like water without a single awkward movement.

 _Mission top secret, destination unknown  
We don't know if we're ever going home  
Stand up! Buckle up! Shuffle to the door.  
Drop outta orbit and shout __**MARINE CORPS!**_

Espo nodded once and winked at Beckett as the formation passed around the two of them before closing ranks again and disappearing around the corner.

After their walk, Castle and Beckett headed for the quarters they had been provided in officer's country. The room was small, barely enough room for the bed, but it allowed them to unwind in relative privacy.

Kate had recognized she'd been unfair to Bishop, but she couldn't control how she felt. The memories of Ash were still too fresh. Castle didn't understand, really, since he had no memory of Ash attacking her on the Nostromo. For him, everything between the incident at the airlock and when he woke up in the hyper-sleep pod aboard the Narcissus to the sound of Charlie's yowling was a complete blank.

* * *

Later that evening, long after a very fevered coupling on the single bed in the room there was a knock on the door. When they opened it, Ryan and Esposito were on the other side, Ryan in his undress whites, and Esposito in battle dress. Kate seemed to brighten immediately, but it was clear the occasion was somber due to the expressions on their faces.

"Castle, Beckett," Esposito said softly, "Master Sergeant Apone wanted us to invite you to a small ceremony to remember Lt. Elise Kim, since you served with her last. Would you please come with us?"

"Of course, guys," Kate whispered, nudging Castle's arm, "let me just get my jacket."

* * *

When they entered the main landing bay, it was clear all of the Marines were in attendance. Captain Olivia Gates entered the bay shortly after they arrived in full dress whites, along with Chief Engineer Sulaco.

"Captain on deck!" came the call from Esposito, and every Marine snapped to.

"As you were," Captain Gates responded.

Bishop's voice came over the ship's intercom. "We will intercept Nostromo's final coordinates in one minute."

The Marines gathered into formation without comment. Captain Gates, LT Cmdr Sulaco and Ryan took up position standing just off to the side of the Marine formation.

"Honors detail," Master Sergeant Apone barked "Ten Hut!"

At his call the entire company of Marines and Naval Officers snapped crisply to attention.

"Crossing coordinates in 5..4...3" Came Bishop's calm voice over the comm.

"Honors detail," Apone called out, "Present...ARMS!"

At his command, every right hand moved slowly from their sides to their eyebrow.

"...one... mark"

For a full minute, the drop ship bay was shrouded in silence as the Marines and Naval Officers of UNSS Sulaco stood at attention, a somber, silent salute to one of their own. Kate gripped Castle's arm, a single tear streaming down her cheek, her head leaning against her husband's broad shoulder.

Ship's officers on duty throughout the vessel stood at silent attention at their posts as the entire ship fell solemnly silent. Even the bay's lighting and the humming of vents seemed muted as the entire ship's company aboard UNSS Sulaco paid silent tribute to their honored dead.

"Honor's Detail," Apone barked, "Order... Arms!"

Hands all over the ship snapped crisply back to their sides, and the Sulaco sprang back to full activity once more.

"Mission briefing in twenty minutes, Honors Detail, dis... missed! " Apone barked, the moment was past and the Marines broke ranks and began to mill about.

* * *

Twenty minutes later, the marines were once again gathered in the bay with Gorman in charge of the proceedings.

"Marines, I know we don't know each other very well, and I'm sorry there wasn't time to brief you before we left Gateway, but—"

"Sir?" Hudson interrupted.

Annoyed, Gorman glanced toward the corporal.

"Yes, what's the question, Marine?"

"Is this going to be a stand-up fight, sir," Hudson asked, "or another bug-hunt?"

"There's not a great deal to explain." Gorman went on, not even bothering to answer the question, "All we know is that there's still been no contact with the colony. Executive Officer Bishop has been trying to raise them since we drew within hailing distance of Acheron with no response. There is a possibility, though remote at this point, that a xenomorph may be involved."

"So, it's a bug-hunt," Hudson snorted.

"For the rest of this briefing," Gorman continued, ignoring Hudson's unsolicited comment, "I am going to turn the briefing over to former warrant officer Kate Beckett, survivor of the civilian transport USCSS Nostromo."

Gorman nodded to Beckett, who slipped her arm out of Castle's and stepped forward. Every set of eyes locked on her, sizing her up and many finding her wanting. Only Ryan and Esposito among those arrayed before her seemed sympathetic.

"We set down on LV-426," Kate began. "to investigate a distress beacon and a member of our search party came back with something... with something... attached to his face."

Castle shivered in spite of himself, he would never forget the sight of Richwood coming out of the vent with that thing inside his helmet.

"It was some sort of parasite," Kate continued, clearly shaken, "We tried to get it off, but it wouldn't come off. Later it fell off on its own and died. First Officer Richwood seemed fine, but when we were... having dinner... it must have laid some sort of embryo in his chest...and he...it..."

"I only need to know one thing." Vasquez interrupted, covering for the disgust she was feeling at the mental image Kate was painting for them.

"Yes?" Kate asked, trying hard to regain her composure.

"Where they are." She pointed her finger at an empty space next to Kate and pulled the trigger, to the hoots and guffaws of approval from most of the Marines. Clearly Esposito was not impressed.

"Yeah, Vasquez kick ass" Drake called out, smacking hands with his fellow smart-gun operator, "just set em up and we'll knock em all down."

"Anytime. Anywhere." Vasquez replied.

"Are you finished?" Kate interrupted, cold authority in her voice for the first time Castle could recall, shutting all of the Marines up. Kate took three steps into Vasquez' personal space, and stared her down. Even Drake was cowed into silence.

"I hope you're right," Kate said, her tone never wavering, "I really do..."

Gorman stepped forward to try to break things up, but Kate shrugged him off.

"...because just one of those things managed to all but wipe out my entire crew in less than twenty four hours. If the colonists have found that ship, there's no telling how many colonists may have been exposed, or how many of those things are down there. _Do you understand?_ "

Vasquez and Beckett's eyes locked. Neither woman looked away and internally, Vasquez' opinion of Kate went up several points during the exchange. Before either could flinch, Gorman broke it up.

"Thank you Ms Beckett," He stated diplomatically, then continued for the troops, "Okay, we have a more detailed account from both Ms. Beckett and Mr. Castle on disk, so I suggest everybody take time to view it. Any questions?"

Hudson's hand shot up.

"Yes, Hudson?" Gorman asked, his patience clearly waning, apparent to everyone but Hudson.

"Sir, how do I get out of this chickenshit outfit?" Hudson asked. It was unclear whether he was kidding or not.

"You secure that shit, Hudson," Apone growled dangerously, but it was clear that Hudson had finally pushed Gorman too far.

"All right. Listen up!" Gorman commanded, his voice low and even, but still conveying anger, "I want this thing to go smooth and by the numbers. DCS and tactical data-base assimilation is to be completed by oh-eight-thirty! Ordnance loading, weapons strip and drop-ship prep details will have seven hours! _Move out!_ "

A series of groans rose from the group, with more than one dirty look cast at Hudson as Gorman stalked out of the bay to a chorus of complaints and groans from the Marines . Apone moved forward and took over the detail and put a stop to it with his very presence.

"Okay Marines," Apone bellowed, "you heard the man and you know the drill, assholes and elbows!"

With that, the complaining ceased. By this time the next morning they would be dropping out of hyper-space and shortly after, would be dropping in on the colony of Archeron.

* * *

Back in their quarters, Castle was shaking with anticipation, his daughter, his little girl was down there, and come hell or high water, he was going to find her. The only barrier between him and that goal was a night's sleep, something neither he, nor Kate were eager for.

Facing their fears would be far easier than the anticipation of it.


	5. Archeron

**Chapter Five  
Archeron**

* * *

 _"Shadows fall a_ _nd hope has fled.  
Steel your heart, the dawn will come.  
_  
The night is long and the path is dark.  
 _Look to the sky, for one day soon,  
The dawn will come."_

The Dawn Will Come  
(From Dragon Age: Inquisition)

* * *

The UNSS Sulaco reverted to normal space with perfect military efficiency within sight of the planetoid Archeron, it's communication relay began busily sending telemetry data as soon she dropped out of FTL like this was any other unscheduled stop. The fully automated communication satellite and it's network of GPS transponders chattered to themselves, blissfully unaware of whatever had transpired on the planetoid below to warrant the presence of a large military transport and its under-strength contingent of Marines.

On the bridge of the Sulaco, there was an air of anticipation in the professional atmosphere.

"We are secured from FTL, Captain," Bishop reported from his station, his hands hovering at the controls, "helm answering, we are free and clear to navigate."

"Thank you Mr. Bishop," Captain Olivia Gates replied from the center seat, "All ahead one third, put us in standard orbit, if you please."

"Aye, Captain," Bishop replied, and his fingers danced over the controls.

The ship surged forward and settled into geosynchronous orbit over Hadley's Hope, the primary settlement on Archeron.

"Standard orbit achieved." Bishop reported.

"Understood." Captain Gates replied. She thought her mother might find it amusing that she was working on an assignment with the very same Richard Castle and Kate Beckett that had given her the majority of her gray hair. Certain that she would have very interesting stories to share on her next shore leave when she visited her parents in their assisted living facility. Her mother had told her stories many times growing up how the two of them had made her life interesting to say the least.

"Mr Bishop, Mr. Ryan you stand relieved." She commanded. "Grab your gear and report to Lt. Gorman."

This mission may not be a standard drop, but procedure called for not just her synthetic's services, but for a fire control officer, and Olivia Gates wanted this mission to go by the book. She watched the man and synthetic in question rise from their stations and exit the bridge, to pass through the CIC on their way to the flight deck.

As other officers took over Ryan and Bishop's stations, Gates thought a moment and decided this was as good a time as any for the battle stations drill she'd arranged it with Chief engineer Sulaco shortly after breakfast. Training cycles were a fact of life aboard ship and Olivia Gates constantly held readiness exercises, especially within hours of hyper-sleep. An enemy would not be so kind as to wait until everybody was fully awake to enter combat. Neither would she. There would be several such drills while they waited for Gorman and his Marines to complete their mission.

She was a firm believer in the axiom: _The more thou sweatest in training, the less thou bleedest in combat._

 _Her_ ship was not going to go out the way UNSS Thresher did. They could damn well name a ship after somebody else as far as she was concerned, _not_ one of hers. A folded flag, a box with two shiny medals in it, and a guaranteed slot at Annapolis were poor substitutes for a live mother, no matter how much she respected Karen Sulaco's sacrifice. She would honor this ship's namesake by not letting what happened to David's mother happen to one of hers. Not on her watch.

"Sound general quarters," Captain Gates ordered crisply. "Action stations flight deck. Set condition one throughout the ship."

At her command, alert klaxons sounded throughout the Sulaco. Internal bulkheads to non mission critical areas slammed closed and locked as lighting shifted from standard illumination to red, the Sulaco's weapons stations were manned and all stations showed combat-ready. Mother's calm voice could be heard through the comms.

" _General quarters, general quarters, all hands man your battle-stations. Condition one is now in effect throughout the ship."_

Captain Gates split her focus between her monitors and the stopwatch in her hand as all stations reported in. When all battle-stations reported ready, she stopped the timer, which stopped at three minutes and fifteen seconds and allowed herself the briefest smile. She was proud of her ship and her crew and was never afraid to show it.

"All hands, this is the Captain speaking," she stated over the comm, "Secure from general quarters, congratulations on beating our previous time by fifteen seconds. Lets show our civilian guests from Weyland-Yutani how a combat drop is done. Lt. Gorman, your mission is go, you are free to deploy."

* * *

In the ready room just outside of the Sulaco's flight deck, the Marines were hard at work strapping on their body armor and readying their weapons. Privates Vasquez and Drake strapped and locked their smart guns to their armor, becoming walking talking artillery as they cycled through the drills for their long barreled weapons. They were now truly in their element, their firepower an extension of their bodies, much like their own limbs.

Master Sergeant Apone stalked the ready room, slapping the backs of each Marine, making sure each trooper received his personal attention, checking the fittings of their body armor and the status of their weapons and equipment. All the while getting them fired up like only a senior NCO can.

"All right, we're a team and there's nothing to worry about." he stated sharply, "Whatever it is going on down there, we will improvise, adapt and overcome. We've come here and we're going to conquer and we're gonna kick some, is that understood?"

"Yes Sir!" The Marines shouted back, as they turned and jogged toward the APC.

"We're gonna go get some!" Apone bellowed, Chasing them down to the flight deck, "Let's move it, Marines, get on the ready line. Let's go! Go! Go! Go! Get some today!"

The Marines ran to the painted line on the deck just short of the APC and lined up as Apone pounded on each trooper's chest armor. It was a familiar dance.

"Absolutely badasses!" he shouted before sliding the door open. "Let's pack em in! Get in there! Move it! One, two, three! Combat seating boys and girls, You know your places, get those weapons stowed!

Castle and Beckett stepped aboard the APC in their matching field jackets from the Nostromo. Before the door fully closed, one of the maintenance workers pulled Castle aside and handed him a long green metal case and whispered in his ear.

" _Your stepmother, Rita sends her regards."_

Wihout another word, she slipped away from the APC hatch and disappeared into the flurry of pre-launch activity. Kate flashed him a questioning look, to which he shrugged his shoulders and secured the case under his seat before settling next to her, neither of them looking forward to their return to LV-426.

Ryan filed in last behind the troopers and took a seat between Kate and Vaughn, placing the company suit between himself and Esposito. Something about that guy simply rubbed him the wrong way, and he was surprised Kate didn't see it. Though it was clear that he definitely caused tension between her and Castle. Javi was busy checking his people, so Ryan took it upon himself to keep an eye on the man as much as possible.

Lt. Gorman was busily strapping himself into his seat in front of a bank of monitors, while at the same time checking their readouts. If anyone had been watching him closely, it would be apparent that he was keeping himself busy by force of will. When he was satisfied with everything he saw, he opened the comm to the driver's station.

"Okay Bishop," he commanded tersely, his nerves beginning to show, "Lets move."

"Rodger," came Bishop's calm reply and the APC surged forward, then reversed direction to back onto the drop ship's low ramp before coming to a stop as the ramp lifted the heavy vehicle into the drop-ship's hull and latched shut.

* * *

In the pilot's seat, Flight Lt. Ferro was strapped in, limbering her hands for the descent ahead. She'd done simulations earlier in preparation for the drop into Archeron's atmosphere, but there was no substitute for the thrill of the real thing for her.

"Stand by cross-loading and auto-cycle." Ferro stated into her helmet mic as powerful load lifters transitioned their small craft into the drop cradle, the short, brief shudder letting her know they were locked in.

"Transferring core control to drop ship alpha," the deck officer stated into her headset, "transition to drop cradle complete, you may launch when ready."

The Sulaco's outer doors opened, giving Ferro and Spunkmeyer their first unassisted view of Archeron through the drop ship's canopy.

"Confirmed, cross locks and drop stations secured," Ferro stated, "Stand by, ten seconds to drop... release sequencer on my mark in five... four... three..."

Back in the APC, Hudson shouted into his helmet comm, drawing a smirk from Ferro as her hands gripped the controls, "One express elevator to hell, going down!"

"...two...one...mark!"

Spunkmeyer hit the release lever and the small ship dropped free from the Sulaco, her thrusters powering them into their descent.

"Switch to DCS ranging," Ferro ordered, happy to have her fate in her own hands as she angled the drop ship on course for the Hadley's Hope settlement.

"Heading two, four zero, nominal to profile," Spunkmeyer reported from his station.

"We are in the pipe, five by five." Ferro muttered, a true grin splitting her face for the first time since waking from hyper-sleep. A combat drop into a challenging environment. She lived for this shit.

"I'm picking up some hull ionization." Spunkmeyer reported."

"Rough air ahead," Ferro reported back to the APC, "We're in for some chop."

* * *

Almost immediately, the whole ship began to shake and rattle. Castle closed his eyes, looking rather pale, he always hated turbulence when he flew. Kate took his hand to offer reassurance, almost wishing she were at the controls, if only to keep her own mind focused. She looked around the confines of the APC hoping for some sort of distraction.

On her second pass, her eyes focused on Lt. Gorman, leaning back into his seat his face staring at the ceiling, eyes squeezed tightly shut, looking almost paler than Castle, his skin, pasty white, but tinged with green and his hands rubbing his knees repeatedly.

"How may drops is this for you, Lieutenant?" Kate asked, hoping that starting a conversation would take both hers and Gorman's minds off of their misery.

"Thirty-eight" Gorman replied shakily, "simulated."

"How many _combat_ drops?" Vasquez asked gruffly from across the aisle.

"Two," Gorman replied, trying to keep his composure, "including this one."

Kate shot a glare at Vaughn, her ire with the company rep clear. His bosses had obviously so downplayed the threat on Archeron, that the Marines had sent a commander this inexperienced into a very dangerous situation. _Castle_ was better prepared for what they were facing and he had almost no combat training. Both Ryan and Esposito could see the wheels turning in her head.

Vasquez and Drake exchanged eye rolls between them. Vasquez mouthed, to Esposito _"Do you believe this shit?"_ Esposito shut them both down with a glare while Apone was busy checking his armor fittings and those of the Marines on either side of him, setting off a chain reaction of every Marine doing the same. Soon every Marine had better things to do than concern themselves with how green their leader was. Perhaps Apone had been paying attention after all.

* * *

If Kate had been able to see outside, she would have noticed that the drop out of orbit, though not entirely free of difficulty, wasn't nearly as hazardous as it had been when she last landed there. The dust that had clogged the Nostromo's intakes was no longer kicked up into the clouds due to the moisture the Terraforming process had introduced into the atmosphere. Though the current chop still made life challenging for Flight Lt. Ferro and her crew chief.

"Turning on final," Ferro stated tersely into the comm, her eyes on her instruments, "Coming around to seven-zero-niner. Terminal guidance locked in."

She cut the comm to the APC and hissed to Spunkmeyer, "Where's the damn beacon?"

Her question would go unanswered - but for a shrug of her crew chief's shoulders - until the drop-ship finally cut below the dense, low cloud ceiling. And into the dark landscape below and suddenly the beacons came into view against the stark backdrop of the planetoid's surface. Once on station, the port and starboard missile launchers deployed, ready for action.

* * *

Kate unlocked herself from her seat restraints and made her way forward -with Castle close on her heels - to the bank of consoles and monitor screens where Gorman was sitting with Vaughn watching over the Lieutenant's shoulder, seemingly fascinated with the young officer's duties now that he had something more pressing to focus his attention upon.

As Kate drew closer, she noted several screens each labeled with a trooper's name with two readouts, one the view from each of their helmet mounted camera, and the other a monitor showing various life function readouts. Though Castle seemed entranced with the gadgetry, Kate's attention was focused on two monitors in particular, marked Esposito, Javier A and Ryan, Kevin J.

Kate had occasionally wondered what had become of her former team at the 12th Precinct after she'd gone into space. Though it was not beyond the pale that Espo would go back to the military, she was surprised that Ryan would follow him, considering his family situation. _Jenny must be worried sick_ , she thought to herself. Now they were in danger again, danger she blamed herself for bringing to their door just as much as she blamed herself for the danger Castle had found himself in to stand at her side.

"Let's move," Gorman ordered, his earlier hesitation seemingly past now that he had real work to do. "Everybody on line."

"All right Marines," Apone commanded, "Gear up! Form up! Two minutes people."

At Apone's command, the Marines rose from their seats and removed their rifles from the storage racks, while Vasquez and Drake helped each other snap into the armor hard points for their smart-guns.

Grateful to finally be able to see outside, Kate pointed at the monitor.

"That the atmosphere processor?" she asked Vaughn.

"Uh-huh. One of thirty or so across the planet." Vaughn replied, relieved that Kate still trusted him for at least general information. As long as that was the case he hoped she wouldn't feel the need to do any digging of her own, which made him feel more confident. "They're completely automated. We manufacture them, by the way."

"Hold at forty." Gorman ordered, "Give me a slow circle of the complex."

Ferro circled the complex, making sure the forward sensor package took in as much of the settlement as possible as she searched for a relatively secure landing zone near the main administration building.

"The structure seems intact." Kate and Rick noted at the same time, "They have power." Kate finished.

On the screen the colony buildings loomed in the low visibility, seemingly scattered at random intervals.

"Apone," Gorman ordered, "let's move em out."

"All right," Apone boomed, "First squad, second squad, Lock and load, I want a nice, clean dispersal this time!"

The Marines pulled back the charging levers on their rifles as Vasquez and Drake powered up their smart guns and strange silence descended over the APC as the Marines and Ryan stacked up at the door, ready to move out. It was time to get down to business, and their loose bravado evaporated, replaced by cold professional determination. .

"Ferro, set down sixty meters this side of the telemetry mast." Gorman ordered, "Immediate dust off when we clear, then stay on station and orbit the complex."

Ferro and Spunkmeyer were busy doing their jobs, with no time for idle chatter, so his only response was two clicks from her mic. Ferro's thumb on the stick flipped the master arm for the forward chain gun, setting the barrels spinning - ready for action. If necessary, the weapon would spit fifteen hundred rounds per minute of 30mm armor piercing incendiary death at a twitch of her finger on the trigger.

"Ten seconds, people," Apone bellowed, "Look sharp!"

* * *

The ship roared down to ground level and the loading ramp extended just as the skids touched ground, ejecting the APC, it's rear wheels barely clearing the ramp before the drop-ship flared back skyward again. Bishop goosed the engine and the APC was on the move through the outer perimeter of the colony.

When the hatch opened, the Marines were on the move, each trooper seeking cover, weapons at the ready as they dispersed. Within a minute, the APC door slammed shut again and the vehicle pulled back to better provide covering fire with it's heavy gun mounts.

"First squad move up," Gorman ordered, "Second squad, cover their approach. Mind your flanks."

"Vasquez, take point." Apone commanded, "Drake fire support, Let's move."

First squad, with Vasquez on point, moved forward, each Marine assigned a specific area to cover with both eyes and rifles until they reached the colony's main entry lock. Two heavy duty tractors were parked as tightly as possible to block the front of the doors. It was clear that whatever happened here, the colony had seen it coming early enough to plan a defense. Vasquez craned her head to check one cab, then the other to note that the controls for each were completely smashed.

Vasquez took cover and waited for Apone, her smart-gun tracking his approach, ready to speak death to any aggressor. When he reached her position and tried the door controls, there was nothing. Not even the whir of the door motors. It was clear that at least somebody among the colonists had military training, likely the colony's marshal. It seemed like a well thought out defense.

"Doors are sealed," Apone husked, "Mr. Ryan, move up and run a bypass."

Ryan moved forward, all business, he gave the door panel a once-over before he pried off the facing and, opened one of his belt pouches for a battery and terminal leads to bypass the powered down door panel.

"First squad, assemble on me at the main lock," Apone ordered quietly, "Second squad, move up and take flanking positions on our six."

As Esposito and second quad moved up to take flanking positions around the entrance, Ryan finished his bypass and the outer doors to the complex whined and then slid partway open. Apone motioned Vasquez inside, she slid her smart-gun up into ready position to worm her way around the two stalled tractors then into the facility and extended her heavy weapon again to cover Apone then the other troopers as one-by one they slung their rifles to follow her.

"Second team, move into the facility," Gorman ordered when first squad was inside.

Vasquez, with Apone not far behind, moved slowly into the main corridor of the facility. The place looked like it had been through a war. There were holes in the walls and ceiling, charred and scored panels all over the place.

"I'm seeing a lot of damage in here from small arms fire," Apone reported, "explosive damage, likely from seismic survey charges. Whatever went down here, the colonists put up a hell of a fight."

* * *

Kate kept her eyes on the bank of monitors, her eyes scanning across all of helmet cams, looking for something she'd seen only once outside of her nightmares. Though her eyes tended to flick back and forth between all of the troopers, her focus always seemed to linger on the monitors marked _"Ryan,"_ and _"Esposito"._ Her hand twitched to the space behind her hip, where her sidearm had always been, but found nothing. It felt wrong to her to be standing in the APC's relative safety while the two of them were going out into danger.

"Quarter and search by twos, Use your motion trackers." Gorman ordered, "Second squad, take the upper level."

Espo led his squad up the stairwell. They emerged cautiously into the empty corridor receding into the dim distance. Ryan unslung the ruggedly built tracker and aimed it down the hall, adjusting the gain as he went.

"Nothing, Javi," Ryan whispered, "No movement."

They passed rooms and offices, troopers split off to clear each room before moving to the next. Through each door they can see increasing signs of the struggle that went on. Overturned furniture, scattered papers, still smoldering embers where fixtures had caught fire.

"Looks like my first off-campus apartment after a bender." Castle quipped, though nobody found it funny, not even him. Kate rolled her eyes without removing her focus from the monitor bank for second squad.

There were no bodies, even though there was enough pooled blood to know that many of the colonists had died where they fell. Several of the exterior windows were blown out, admitting wind and rain.

* * *

Apone's troopers, searched systematically in pairs, finding much the same carnage as second squad upstairs as they passed through the colonists' small modest apartments, clearing each one as they went, field stripping any weapons as they found them. Hudson was on his tracker, flanking Vasquez as they moved through their assigned wing. Hudson touched a splash of color on the wall, which turned out ot be dried blood spatter.

His tracker beeped and Vasquez whirled, smart-gun at the ready. As the two of them advanced toward the half-open door splintered partway out of its frame, the walls peppered with holes from pulse rifle fire.

Vasquez eased silently up next to the door frame as Hudson brought his own pulse rifle up and kicked it in. both of them tensing to fire... only to find a junction box swinging like a pendulum in the wind from the broken window as it clanked against the rails of a child's bunk bed.

Kate could tell by the look burning on Vasquez' face that she was feeling more than ire at not having an enemy to fight. This had been a _child's_ bedroom – there had been children here - the anguish the Hispanic woman was trying to hide, Kate knew without looking was mirrored on her husband's face without filters. _His child_ was here - no matter how much older she'd grown while they were gone - and his anguish grew with each empty, carnage-filled room the troopers passed.

She remembered it well from Alexis' kidnapping early into their relationship. Only this time there was no accomplice to torture, no outlet for his growing sense of helplessness. There was nobody but Vaughn for him to blame and she would have to be careful to keep herself between her husband and the company rep, make certain the two were never left alone in each other's company.

Vaughn only saw the millionaire playboy author, a facade he projected very well to strangers, but the company man really had no idea the level of violence her husband was capable of when it came to protecting his family.

Kate's reverie was soon broken by something she'd seen out of the corner of her eye on Ryan's monitor.

"Wait!" she husked to Gorman, "Tell Ryan to... never mind," Kate plugged her headset into the jack, "...Ryan! Back up and pan your camera left! Right there!"

As the image shifted on Ryan's monitor, revealing a section of wall heavily corroded through in an irregular pattern only she and Castle would have recognized. The two of them stared at it, then turned back to each other, horror in both of their eyes, they knew exactly what it meant.

"You seeing this okay?" Ryan asked, signaling for Esposito closer, "Looks melted, not shot or burned or blasted through."

"Looks like somebody bagged one of Castle and Beckett's bad guys here." Esposito said, nodding in agreement with Ryan.

Vaughn turned to both Castle and Beckett and raised an eyebrow at them. The wheels in his brain turning at the possibilities. _Hmm._ He thought to himself, _Acid for blood._

"Hey, if you like that, you're gonna love this..." Hudson cut in over the comm channel, his helmet cam looking down into a gaping hole, with another one in the floor directly beneath at his feet. The acid having obviously melted through to the maintenance level two floors below, revealing pipes, conduit, and electronic equipment...eaten away by the ferocious substance. Just like it had on the Nostromo.

"Second squad?" Apone called over the comm, "Status report."

"Just finished our sweep," Esposito reported, "Nobody's home."

"This place is dead, sir," Apone reported to Gorman, "whatever happened here, we missed it."

Gorman turned to the others, with an almost sympathetic look at Castle and Beckett who seemed to be in a state of shock.

"All right, the area appears to be secured," he stated, "Let's go in and see what their computer can tell us."

He turned back to his monitors and reached for the jack to plug his headset into the portable unit on his belt.

"First squad head for operations," He ordered, "Hudson, you and Ryan see if you can get their CPU on line. Second squad, meet me at the south lock by the up-link tower, we're coming in."

Hudson switched off his mic and rolled his eyes sarcastically, "He's coming in, I feel safer already."

"Pendejo jerkoff." Vasquez muttered quietly in agreement.

* * *

Lights arced across the dormant buildings as the APC turned onto the "main drag." and trundled down the rutted street, throwing up sheets of filthy water as the massive wheels hit water-filled potholes. Windblown rain lashed across the headlights in the sudden downpour.

Esposito emerged from the south lock just as the APC rolled up close to the entrance. The crew-door slid back Gorman emerged, followed by Vaughn, Bishop, and Wierzbowski. Vaughn looked back to see Beckett stop in the APC doorway, eyeing the ominous colony structure, then back to her husband, who had a reassuring arm at her back. She relaxed into his side and followed them into the building.

For the first time on this trip, Vaughn was relieved that Castle had forced his way onto the mission. He had more ideas and possibilities running through his head than he knew hoe to deal with, without having to hold his consultant's hand. There were too many things he wanted to do that he didn't want witnesses for, not even the one he'd wanted along. Though he would have preferred it, had Kate needed a teddy bear or some other childhood talisman, he guessed her husband would simply have to do.

"Sir," Esposito stated, after snapping to attention, "the CPU is on-line."

"As you were, Sergeant," Gorman replied, "have the others stand by in operations, Let's go."

"Looks like your company can write off its share of this colony." Gorman quipped, noting both Castle's dark expression and Beckett's death glare at his inappropriate attempt at gallows humor.

Vaughn shrugged, keeping his voice neutral, "It's insured."

Nobody noticed Castle slip a nine millimeter Glock into Kate's hand. An expression passed between them, but Kate slipped the pistol into her belt behind her back and slid her jacket over it without a word. Her eyes flashed gratitude at her husband for knowing what she needed before she knew she needed it. She would ask where the weapon had come from later.

They moved along through the corridor, taking in the ravaged administration complex with its fire-gutted offices with unrepressed horror. Esposito motioned to Wierzbowski with his eyes and the trooper casually falls in beside them, rifle at ready. Kate glanced at him to which he winked before returning to his duties.

"Sir, you should check this out," Corporal Frost stated, motioning them into the wider corridor.

The wing was completely without power. The troopers switch on their pack lights and the beams illuminate a scene of devastation worse than they have seen.

"Right ahead here," Frost pointed out, nodding to Gorman and Esposito as they approached a barricade blocking the corridor, a hastily welded wall of pipes, steel-plate and heavy door panels. Acid holes slashed through the floor and walls in several places. The metal scratched and twisted by hideously powerful forces and peeled back like a soup can on one side.

The pack-lights played over the devastation of what had to be the scene of the colonists' last stand. The walls were perforated from pulse-rifle fire and acid. What wasn't shot, blasted or corroded through had been scorched by untended fires down to the bare metal. A few instruments glowed dimly, providing the only other illumination.

"Looks like their last stand," Wierzbowski muttered, receiving an elbow from Esposito, who knew that was the last thing Castle needed to hear, considering little Castle had to have been here for it.

"No bodies?" Gorman asked.

"None that we could find, sir." Frost replied. "Looks like they put up one helluva fight though."

Nobody noticed at first that Castle and Beckett's eyes were transfixed by something they had hoped never to see again. Especially not someplace where Alexis might be.

"Over here," they finally said in unison, drawing Esposito's attention, finally catching sight of what the two of them were staring at with a mix of horror and revulsion.

In a storage alcove at eye level stood seven stasis tubes glowing faintly with an eerie violet light given off by the field preserving the specimens inside. Each container held a creature with the shape of an eight fingered hand, the palsied fingers curled in what appeared to be full rigor. Both Castle and Beckett's eyes were wide with horrified recognition, unable to turn away from them.

"Are these the same...?" Vaughn asked.

Kate nodded, unable to speak, her hand drawn against her will to her shoulder where the one that had attacked Richwood had touched her.

Vaughn leaned in closer, fascinated, his mind turning, his nose almost touching one cylinder.

"Watch it, Vaughn..." Kate warned.

The creature inside lunged suddenly, slamming it's "palm" against the glass, making Vaughn jump back and squeal like a little girl. The tube thrust out of the creature's palm and slithered against the inside of the stasis pod before retracting into its sheath again.

"It likes you," Esposito muttered to Vaughn, rather enjoying the company suit's discomfort.

When he recovered his composure, Vaughn tapped each of the stasis tubes, but only one more of the others responded to his presence, the rest of the surreal hand-things remaining firmly clenched in death.

"Only two of them are still viable, the rest are dead." he muttered, once again entranced.

In a slot next to each stasis cylinder was a clipboard, Kate snatched up the chart next to one of the live specimens to read the printout with handwritten entries. Noting they were signed by "Rodgers, Alexis H."

"Removed surgically before embryo implantation," Kate read, "Subject: Marachuk, John L. Patient died during procedure."

Kate looked up, trying to avoid Castle's eyes, "They killed him getting it off."

"Poor bastard," Esposito muttered, his eyes on Castle, sympathy clear as day in his expression.

Everyone was startled by a loud beep from the motion tracker hanging from Esposito's hip. He grabbed it, watching the screen as it continued to beep while he swung it slowly back toward the shattered barricade in the next room.

"Behind us." Esposito hissed, snapping his fingers at Weizerbowski and Frost, gesturing back at the corridor they just passed through.

"One of us?" Kate asked, prompting Gorman to get on the comms,

"Apone...where are your people?" He husked. "Anybody in D-Block?"

"Negative, sir," came Apone's immediate reply, "We're all in Operations."

Vasquez swung her smart-gun to ready position on its support arm with an authoritative click as she and Esposito moved toward the source of the signal, the others following, his tracker beeping more rapidly. Kate followed closely behind, waving Castle back between the two armed Marines.

"It's moving." Esposito muttered, drawing a nod from Vasquez.

"Which way?" the smart-gunner replied, prompting Espo to nod his head toward a complicated array of food processing equipment in the mess hall. They moved forward, weapons leveled as the tracker beeped more steadily, then turned to a solid tone.

Something small moved in the dark, a flash of red hair in the lamp-light toppled a rack of metal utensils, sending them crashing to the floor. Vasquez tracked smoothly and opened fire with her smart-gun, but Kate forced its barrel upward sending the stream of tracer fire into the ceiling.

"What the fuck!" Vasquez shouted, trailing off into Spanish.

Esposito ignored her and shouldered past, aiming his light under the row of steel cabinets. He gestured to Kate who crouched beside him to look.

As her eyes adjusted to the light, she saw the tiny, cowering figure of a dirty, terrified red-haired girl clutching a plastic food packet in one hand and in the other, the head of what had once been a rather large doll by the hair. She stared back at them with wide eyes, pathetically emaciated... red hair tangled and matted.

"Come on out, sweetie," Kate whispered, "It's all right."

Kate moved slowly toward her, trying to appear as reassuring as possible as she reached under the cabinet, but the girl backed away, trembling visibly, her blue eyes wide. Kate's hand almost reached her, but she bolted at the last second, skittering beneath the cabinetry. Kate scrambled to follow, desperate to keep her in sight.

Crabbing frantically sideways. Esposito made a grab for her, catching one tiny ankle. His hand snapped open a moment later as the girl bit down on the meat of his hand.

"Ow! Shit!" Espo shouted, "Watch it, Beckett, she bites!"

The girl scrambled into a ventilation duct set in the baseboard, its grille kicked out, wriggling like a fish to get herself inside. Without thinking, Kate snatched the light from Esposito's pack and dove into the duct. The child entered a dark space and slammed a steel hatch closed, but Kate shoved it back open before the child could latch it and wormed in after her. The little girl backpedaled out of reach at the far end of the tiny steel chamber.

Kate took in the nest, in the small chamber... obviously prepared by a young child. Wadded up blankets and pillows lined the space, mixed in with a haphazard array of items foraged from the wrecked colony. The girl knelt across the small space from her, holding a wrench almost as big as she was, keeping her tiny body between Kate and what appeared to be a human-sized cocoon of pillows and blankets.

Kate moved in fast, disarming the child with almost ridiculous ease and wrapped her up tight in a bear hug. The girl struggled and squirmed, eyes wide, hands lashing out in a frenzy, but was no match for the stronger, well fed, adult. Kate pulled back the blanket to reveal a face she barely recognized. _Alexis Castle_.

"No..." the girl moaned as she continued to struggle while Kate pressed two fingers to find Alexis' pulse which was slow, but steady, though Alexis was unresponsive to her attempts to shake her awake,

"...don't hurt mommy!"

 _Mommy?_ Kate thought to herself.

"It's okay," Kate whispered in the girl's ear, "it's okay. It's over... nobody's gonna hurt your mommy... it's okay...you're safe," until the girl went limp in her arms. Kate looked over the child's face, her lips white and trembling, eyes tracking wildly as she flinched from unseen terrors of the dark nightmare world in her eyes. A nightmare world Kate found horrifyingly familiar.

Kate's eyes fell on something amidst the debris, which upon closer inspection, was a framed photograph depicting a cleaner, more innocent, smiling version of the traumatized girl in her arms dressed smartly in her school clothes with a ribbon in her fire red hair. Embossed gold letters underneath the photo read:

 **FIRST GRADE CITIZENSHIP AWARD**

 **Rebecca M. Rodgers**

 _Oh, Castle,_ Kate thought to herself as she ran her fingers through Alexis' hair, brushing it from her feverish forehead as she hugged Castle's granddaughter tightly to her chest, trying her best not to cry as she whispered reassuring words softly in Rebecca's ear.

* * *

Rebecca Rodgers sat huddled in a chair in medical while Corporal Dietrich looked her over, arms wrapped tightly around her knees, her eyes staring forward, eyes fixed on some horror only she could see. Castle sat in front of the auto-doc, still a little in shock after the Marines had managed to get Alexis out of the small alcove and into medical. The reality of ten years weighing on his mind as his eyes darted from the readouts of the machine working on his thirty-two year old daughter and his granddaughter across the room. Neither he nor Rebecca took note of Gorman's approach

"What's her name again?" Gorman asked brusquely.

"Rebecca," Dietrich replied, "her mother would likely be a better source of information, but she's still unresponsive. The infection from her injury was pretty bad, another couple of days and she would have been too far gone. I recommend she be medivac'd to the Sulaco as soon as she comes out of the auto-doc."

Gorman hunched down on his knees in front of her while Dietrich watched the readouts from the bio monitor wrapped around her tiny arm.

"I need you to think, Rebecca," Gorman began. "Concentrate. I need to know what happened here. Just start at the beginning..."

Rebecca made no attempt to respond, her eyes staring blankly ahead, focused on terrors only she can see.

Where did everybody go?" Gorman continued, obviously terrible with traumatized children, "You, have to try..."

Castle shot out of his seat, having seen and heard quite enough.

"Gorman!" he rasped, a very dangerous look in his eyes, one even the Marine Lieutenant was wise to back away from, "Give it a rest would you? She's just a little girl, not one of your Marines!"

"Total brain-lock," Gorman stated to Dietrich with a sigh of dismissal, "let me know if her mother wakes up and can give us some answers, otherwise we're wasting our time."

Castle approached the girl carefully after watching the lieutenant stalk from the room.

"How's she doing?' He asked softly, still trying to wrap his brain around the idea that he had a granddaughter, though he couldn't deny the resemblance. She looked so much like her mother at that age.

Dietrich shrugged as she unsnapped the bio-monitoring cuff.

"Physically she's okay, borderline malnutrition, but I don't think there's any permanent damage. Her mother must have dragged her in there with her before her injuries went septic. I can't imagine a child that small could have gotten her in there otherwise. Poor thing probably did the best she could to take care of her after that. The dressings she kept applying likely made the difference."

Castle knelt in front of the girl and brushed her unkempt hair out of her eyes.

"Here, try this," he said softly, handing her the cup he'd made for himself, "A little hot chocolate."

He wrapped the girl's hands around the cup and raised it to her lips for her. The girl drank mechanically, spilling some of the warm liquid down her chin.

"Poor thing," Castle whispered, falling in love with her already, "You don't talk much do you? That's okay. Most people talk way too much and say far too little."

He set the cup down and wiped the her chin, not knowing Kate was watching his every move, her heart filling up with warmth and her eyes filling with tears as he doted on the girl.

"Uh oh," Castle sing-songed, "Now I've done it, I made a clean spot. Guess I'll just have to do the whole thing."

He wet a small cloth and gently cleaned the grime from the little girl's face, humming a song he used to sing Alexis to sleep with as he worked and her eyes seem to focus for the first time.

"Hard to believe...there's a little girl under all this" Castle whispered, "and a pretty one, just like your mother was at your age." Rebecca gazed up at him and he gave her a soft smile.

* * *

The ground teams gathered around a terminal in the computer center. where Hudson paging through the main colony ground plan, the schematics paging across the screen one section of the coloony at a time, his fingers dancing expertly across the keyboard.

"What's he scanning for?" Vaughn asked.

"Personal-Data Transmitters," Gorman answered, "Every adult colonist had one surgically implanted. I'm surprised you didn't know that."

"If they're within twenty klicks," Hudson explained, "we'll read it out here as soon as I find the right location. Ryan's working on what's left of the security video feed, but so far...zip on either end."

"Keep at it," Gorman ordered, "both of you."

* * *

Castle started washing Newt's tiny hands with the same cloth as her face, her pale pink skin emerging from black grime.

"You did an amazing job keeping yourself and your mother alive," he whispered, "you're a brave little girl, Rebecca, I'm very proud of you."

"N-newt," she whispered so quietly Rick almost didn't hear her, so he leaned in a little closer.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart," he said, hoping to draw her further out, "I didn't hear you."

"Newt," she repeated a little louder, "everybody calls me Newt. Only my mother calls me Rebecca."

Kate kept watching the two of them interact from the door, not wanting to move or speak... lest she break the spell as Castle took the girl's tiny hand in his and shook it formally.

"Well... Newt it is then. Most people call me Rick...or Castle," Rick replied, "but I suppose you can call me Grandpa if you like."

Newt nodded.

"And who is this?" Castle asked, indicating the doll's head in her hand. "Does she have a name?"

Newt glanced down at the disembodied doll still clutched in one hand and thought about it for a moment.

"Casey," she replied softly. "She's my only friend."

"What about me?" Castle asked, "or my wife Kate there in the doorway? Can we be your friends too?"

Kate blushed at being caught out staring when Newt looked tentatively in her direction, but kept quiet listening to the exchange.

"I don't want you for a friend," Newt's replied, her voice flat and neutral, "Kate either. I don't wanna love anybody ever again."

"Why not?" Rick replied, hurting for the girl, but trying to show it.

"Because you'll be gone soon, like daddy, or dead like everybody else." Newt whispered without shedding a tear, "you'll leave me all alone again."

Kate stood in the doorway, chilled both by Newt's ominous statement and by any situation which could have produced such fatalism in a child.

"Oh baby, your mom isn't gone, she's right here," Rick soothed, taking her hand and leading her over to the observation port for the auto-doc, pointing out the various indicators. "You see these? They say that mommy is still alive and she's fighting to come back to you."

"She still left," Newt whimpered, tears starting to fill her eyes.

"Not by choice, sweetheart," Rick said with absolute conviction, "I know my daughter, she would never leave you by choice and she's fighting with everything she has to come back to you as we speak."

"H-how do you know?" Newt asked, not quite willing to let herself believe him yet.

"Because Kate and I went away and left _her_ alone," Rick whispered, all of his guilt choking his voice with emotion, "and we fought just as hard to come back for her."

"Newt." he whispered, kneeling on the floor to put himself at her eye level, in spite of the pain radiating from his bad knee as their eyes met, "No matter how far I go, no matter how long it takes, I will always come to find you."

"You promise?" Newt whispered, her eyes shimmering with hope for the first time since she'd appeared in his life.

"I promise," Castle swore, pulling Newt into his arms, engulfing her as tears pricked his eyes. "Always."

That one small – and huge – promise was all it took to break down the wall that Newt had erected brick by brick over the past two months, just like he had for Kate once upon a time, which touched Kate's heart in a way she could not have imagined. She knew what that word meant to Castle.

Always meant _forever._ She had tested the veracity of of his commitment to that one word often enough to know he never used it lightly.

Newt gazed at Rick, her eyes beginning to brim over with tears. Her lower lip trembled, just before her resolve crumbled, she wrapped her arms around Rick's neck and sobbed uncontrollably. Rick rocked her gently, tears of suppressed grief and hurt rolling down his face, sharing a look with Kate over Newt's head as he kissed her hair, both of them hoping that his promise could be kept.

* * *

"Hah!" Hudson exclaimed, "Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen! Found 'em."

"Alive?" Gorman asked from the doorway where he had been conferring with Vaughn.

"Unknown," Hudson replied, "But, it looks like all of them. Atmosphere processing station... sub-level 'C' under the south tower."

Ryan looked over Hudson's shoulder at the screen, showing the massive cluster of blue dots all in one space.

"Looks like a Goddamn town meeting," he muttered.

"That's our cue, Gorman said, "Apone, let's mount up."

"Awright, let's go girls," Apone commanded, "they ain't payin' us by the hour. Dietrich stays here to monitor her patient, everybody else. Saddle up."

* * *

 _ ****Author's Note** There are two Battlestar Galactica references in this chapter, one from the original series in 1979 and the other from the SciFi channel remake. Style points to anyone who finds them.**_

 _ **Since Castle and Beckett share the role of Ripley in this AU, I figured if anybody was gonna get through to a traumatized little girl, it would be Castle.**_

 _ **I know that Jericho Steele has been looking forward to this part of the story. Semper Fi dude.**_

 _ **Garrae, and Lady Ailith, the ride gets… interesting from here.**_

 _ **Travis, I'm gonna try to grind out one more chapter by the Halloween deadline.**_


	6. Stranded

**Chapter Six  
Stranded**

* * *

" _In Peace: Vigilance  
In War: Victory  
In Death: Sacrifice"_

The Gray Warden Oath from Dragon Age Origins

* * *

The APC roared across the bleak landscape of Archeron, its heavy wheels grinding along the causeway between the buildings of the colony proper from the automated atmosphere processing station over a kilometer away. Behind the swiftly moving ground vehicle, the drop ship could be seen settling onto it's landing skids and dropping the ramp to reveal Spunkmeyer running to retrieve one of the service trucks to keep the electronics spinning while the ship was powered down to conserve its batteries.

 _It's gonna be a long day once they find the colonists._ Spunkmeyer thought to himself. The drop-ship would be making multiple trips to the Sulaco and back, the first of which to replace the APC with the Medivac pod, along with Dr. Parish and her trauma team. He knew Ferro needed at least a little downtime before that, while he conferred with Dietrich and Bishop about the casualty in the Colony's med bay who would likely be one of the first evacuees as soon as the APC came back.

As the APC drew nearer to the massive structure, the conical exhaust tower began to come into view, flickering with spectral light as it continued - in concert with the twenty nine others dotted across the surface - to inexorably do its job of remaking Archeron's atmosphere in Earth's image.

* * *

Inside the APC, the troopers sat quietly, their few interactions subdued with the knowledge that they had arrived too late to do what they came for. All of them felt the sense of failure keenly and any exuberance in the face of that failure would have rung strangely hollow. The civilians of the colony had stood, fought, and fallen while they slept, leaving only a traumatized six year old and her comatose mother behind to tell the tale. There was no possible way for them to feel good about that.

They were supposed to be the cavalry, the soldiers who rode in at the nick of time to save the day. Only this time the cavalry had come too late. Leaving only an accounting of the casualties and a mopping up operation to be done.

The Marines sat in their seats, bouncing in the heavily sprung vehicle, many of them only pausing in their own thoughts to spare smile or a wink for Newt, - the only colonist they had managed to save – as she sat between Castle and Beckett in the jump seats just aft of the driver's cockpit.

Inexplicably, the biggest offender in the "support Newt brigade" among the Marines was Vasquez, who made a point to offer her water or something to eat, even found her a jacket that fit to shield her from the cold. Whether it was from guilt for having almost shot the little girl or misplaced maternal instinct, nobody who watched her practically dote on the child (for her anyway) could say.

Even Drake, the closest thing Vasquez had to a soulmate was shocked at her sudden softness. Pvt. Angie Vasquez was as hard and cold as they came, but like the rest of them - including Apone who had affixed one of his own patches to the girl's jacket unofficially "adopting" her into the unit – she had developed a soft spot for the girl who had - without training - adapted, improvised, and overcame the nightmare she and her mother found themselves in, kept her mother alive and survived until help came. To the marines, that was simply tough enough.

Kate quietly watched Castle with Newt. It had not been an easy decision to bring her along, but Gorman and Vaughn had insisted both of them come along to observe. Once it was clear that they couldn't stay, Castle hadn't wanted to leave Newt alone with Dietrich, (and Kate certainly didn't trust Bishop) he was afraid that left to her own devices, she would slip back into the ducts and disappear.

Once that was settled, and Vasquez had produced a jacket and change of clothes for the girl, it had been settled. Though Kate had feared the danger had not passed, Castle had pointed out that the colony wasn't really safe either, at least not as safe as an armored APC filled with Marines who considered her a little sister. Kate had not been able to refute his logic at the time.

"I was the best at the game." Newt whispered, beaming with almost pride, though her hurt was still clear just below the surface, "I knew the whole maze."

"You mean the air ducts?" Castle whispered, his own pride at her resourcefulness on full display.

"Yeah," Newt replied, almost sadly, "you know. In the walls, under the floor... I was the queen of hide and seek. I could hide better than anybody."

"You're really something, kiddo." Castle replied as he hugged the girl reassuringly, not seeing the other Marines - Apone included - nod in agreement. As far as Apone and the rest of them were concerned, the little girl had the heart of a Marine.

Kate's gaze shifted to look out the windshield watching the processing station loom closer as the APC moved inexorably forward. Images burned in her brain of that small space in Nostromo's engine room where she'd found Captain Kim and Granger's mutilated body. Images that loomed darkly in her thoughts, memories mixed with nightmares, barely recalled, indistinct and hazy- leaving her unsure what was memory and what was PTSD induced nightmare. To say she was shaken to her core would be a gross understatement. Only Castle's support and her own stubborn pride insisting she see this through to the end kept her moving.

When the APC finally rolled to a stop, the Marines rose from their seats and moved to stack up at the door almost before Apone's command. Apone stopped at the door, and turned to fire up his people.

"Boys and girls, these things took down a colony," Apone growled, his own face twisted into a mask of rage, "But we aren't civilians, WE ARE MARINES! Yea though we walk through the valley of death whom shall we fear?"

"Nobody!" came the response from the Marines, but it didn't sound like they meant it.

"I can't _**hear**_ you!" Apone said louder, "Whom, shall we fear?"

" **NOBODY!** " they shouted louder.

"That's right!" Apone shouted, "we're _**COLONIAL MARINES**_ we _**are**_ the biggest **baddest** motherfuckers in the valley!"

Apone slid the door open hard, pointing out the door, "Now get out there and show these fuckers why! First squad Second squad saddle up! Lets go git em! Get some today!"

They fanned out at the door to the APC and dispersed cleanly, deploying by squads, much as they had done before when they arrived at the colony. Their despair at having arrived too late to protect the colony now turned to anger and determination. It was payback time.

"Forty meters in," Gorman stated into the comm, an eye on the schematics for the refinery on his screen, "Ramp on axial two-two, then stairwell access to the sub-levels."

The Marines formed up and started down the open vehicle access ramp, eyes on a swivel, mindful of their spacing. Diffused light filtered down through several levels of the steel mesh floor, catwalks and pipes. Below that, everything was shrouded in darkness.

"B-Level," Gorman added, "Next one down."

The thrumming of machines in the fully automated facility grows louder as they descend into the darkened sub-level..

* * *

Kate, Rick and Vaughn moved closer to Gorman's seat and watched the screens for the various Marines as they move down the stairs in twos to avoid bunching up, shoulder-mounted cameras set on infra red had all of the screens reading in black and white like an old sci fi movie. Newt stood between Rick and Kate, clinging to Castle's leg, feeling trapped between not wanting to see, but not wanting to be left out either. Castle stroked her hair, while Kate found her hand drifting to the girl's shoulder, having found comforting Castle's granddaughter a welcome distraction from her own tortured thoughts.

The deeper the Marines went into the facility, the grainier and less distinct the images from the cameras became, which Gorman found troubling, from the expression on his face.

"We're not making that out too well, Sgt. Esposito," Gorman states into his headset, "What is it?"

"You tell me," Esposito replied, his voice shrouded in static, "I only work here."

The group stood before a bizarre tableau, one that Kate found frighteningly familiar. Among the lattice of pipes, vents and conduits, something not of human origin had been added. A strange encrustation, vaguely resembling the chambers of a wasp's nest on a massive scale, was so gradually blended into the original structure that it was hard to distinguish where one ended and the other began. Though the alien structure seemed to extend all the way back into the complex of machinery, the plant thrummed and pulsed along, its functions seemingly unimpaired.

Kate stared blankly at the scene in dread fascination. She had seen it before, but the memory had been blurred by nightmare, blocked along with what really happened to Captain Kim, but those memories were being forced to the surface by a slowly encroaching reality that Kate wished for the thousandth time she didn't have to be part of.

"What is it?" Gorman asked.

"I...I don't know," Kate replied, her voice shaking "but...but it looks familiar."

"Apone, proceed inside," Gorman ordered, "Esposito, Ryan, hold at the stairwell to maintain communications integrity and stand ready to triage survivors."

* * *

Ryan and Esposito pulled back and set up a signal booster on the stairwell, then secured their position. Neither of them liked it, waiting here while the others set off into the unknown, but orders were orders.

Apone and the others moved forward into the organic looking labyrinth, playing their lights over the walls. In the highly directional light, the walls took on an almost organic appearance. The air was humid and thick with steam, giving the place an ethereal appearance, like they were inside a living thing, not a man-made sub-basement.

* * *

Back in the APC, Kate was quietly freaking out, working through her breathing exercises to stave off a full blown panic attack. Her nightmares were coming alive right in front of her eyes and reaching out to her and the people she loved.

"Oh God..." she whispered, settling only when Castle's arm wrapped around her.

The video from each Marine revealed a concretion of detritus from the colony: furniture, wiring, human bones, skulls... all fused together by a translucent, tar-like substance.

"Looks like some sort of secreted resin." Frost said through the static.

"Yeah," Hudson asked, "but secreted from what?'

"Nobody touch nothin'," Apone ordered darkly.

"They ripped apart the colony for building materials." Gorman whispered, covering his mic with his hand.

"And the colonists" Castle and Beckett muttered at the same time, "When they were done with them," Castle added dully. "Newt, you better go sit up front. Go on."

Castle placed a hand at Newt's back and gently sent her on her way forward, in spite of the protest in her eyes.

"Busy little creatures," Vaughn noted with something almost like awe, his eyes never leaving the screen.

* * *

Steam swirled around the Marines as they moved deeper into the macabre chambers of the station. A mix of both fascination and horror on their faces. Nothing in their training had prepared them for anything like this. Reading about these things in Beckett's testimonial and seeing evidence of it in front of their eyes were two very different things.

"Hotter'n hell in here," Frost muttered.

"Yeah," Hudson quipped, trying to mask his growing apprehension with humor, "but it's a dry heat."

"Knock it off, Hudson," Apone ordered, and for once the man kept his mouth firmly shut.

* * *

Back on the APC, something began to dawn on Kate, something about where the Marines were going.

"Lieutenant, what do those pulse rifles fire?' Kate asked.

"Ten millimeter explosive tipped caseless," Gorman replied with a shrug, "standard light armor piercing round, why?"

"Well look at where your team is," Kate replied, "They're right under the primary heat exchangers."

"So?" Gorman asked, obviously not making the connection.

"So, if they fire their weapons in there, won't they rupture the cooling system?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Vaughn added, finally grasping Kate's reasoning, "She's right.

"So?" Gorman asked again. "So what?"

"This station is basically one big fusion reactor." Vaughn stated, "So one misplaced round and you're talking about a big nuclear explosion, then adios muchachos."

"Oh great, wonderful! Shit! " Gorman swore before getting on the mic, "Apone, we can't have any firing in there. I want you to collect magazines from everybody."

* * *

The troopers look at each other in dismay when they heard the order.

"Is he fucking crazy?" Hudson exclaimed.

What're we supposed to use, man?" Frost muttered. "Harsh language?

"Flame-units only," Gorman ordered over the comm, "I want rifles slung, Sergeant, and no grenades."

"All right sweethearts, you heard the man," Apone commanded, as he walked among the troopers, collecting the magazines from each of them, "pull 'em out, let's have em!"

Vasquez and Drake turned the firing cores for their smart-guns over reluctantly.

Three marines unslung their flame units, but when Apone moves past them, Vasquez turned her headset mounted camera aside and slipped two spares from a pouch in her harness, inserted one into her weapon by feel alone as she slipped the other to Drake.

"Let's move." Apone ordered, "Hudson, back us up."

The Marines moved forwar4d, now armed only with flame units and an odd assortment of personal weapons, some scavenged from the colony armory. None of them were happy about the situation. Though they might have understood Gorman's order better had they known just how close to a nuclear fusion reactor they were.

"Any movement?" Gorman requested.

"Nothing," Hudson reported, "Zip."

Apone moved into the next room and stopped, his expression changing from irritation to revulsion in the blink of an eye. Inside was a charnal house of living horror. Cocoons Kate immediately recognized protruded from walls evenly spaced within the structure. The bodies of the colonists inside them frozen in twisted macabre positions of agony. Most of them were dead, rib-cages burst outward, as if exploded from within, having been entombed as hosts for the embryos that had grown within them then burst forth.

Weizerbowski moved forward to examine one of the figures which was still intact. A ghost-white woman's face. Her eyes snapped open, as if to plead with him.

"Sir!"" Weizerbowski called out after jumping back from the now animated 'corpse', "we got a live one here!

"Kill me... please... God," The woman whispered feebly, "kill me."

* * *

Kate's knuckles turned white as she stared into the woman's eyes. It was the same look she'd seen in Captain Kim's eyes on the Nostromo, right before she'd turned her flamethrower on her. She could hear somebody retching over the comms, but didn't scan the screens to find out who.

* * *

The woman began to convulse almost immediately, her screams a piercing shriek of mindless agony.

"Flame thrower!" Apone ordered, reaching out his hand, palm up.

Frost handed his flame unit over, slapping it into Apone's outstretched palm just as the woman's chest exploded outward in a gout of blood and gore right before a small fanged head emerged from the the woman's torso, shrieking loudly.

Apone swung the flamethrower around and pulled the trigger, the other troopers carrying flame throwers opened fire as well all backing toward the exit, bathing the whole room in purging fire. A high pitched shrill shrieking began, like a siren call from the pit of hell.

Behind them and ahead of them in the dark, multiple somethings began to emerge. Creatures larger then a man and black as night that had blended perfectly with the convoluted surface affixed to the tunnel walls until they began to silently unfold themselves. Apone and his troopers couldn't see or hear them as the nightmare things converged on them from all sides.

"I have movement!" Hudson called out.

"Position?" Apone asked immediately

"I can't get a lock..." Hudson replied, but trailed off, still trying to get a handle on the readings as he adjusted his tracker while simultaneously trying to tamp down his own sense of dread.

"Talk to me, Hudson," Apone commanded, his experience telling him that Hudson was losing it.

"Uh, Multiple signals in front and behind," Hudson replied, beginning to panic. "Everywhere!"

"We can't see anything back here, Apone," Gorman called out, "What's going on?"

* * *

Both Castle and Beckett could feel it coming, like a nightmare they both thought they had awakened from, only to find it had followed them into the waking world... dark, terrifying and inevitable. And it had brought a host of friends with it.

"Pull your team out, Gorman," they said in unison.

* * *

"Go to infrared," Apone ordered, "Look sharp people!"

The squad members snapped down their IR visors. And prepared what weapons they had.

"Multiple signals still incoming," Hudson shouted, "All round. Closing."

Weizerbowski turned to retreat, his flamethrower held tightly, but a nightmarish silhouette materialized from the smoke and shadows behind him, six inch claws extended from long fingers. It struck like lightning and seized him and he fired reflexively, the jet of flame from his weapon engulfing Frost nearby.

Apone spun at the sound of Frost's quickly fading screams, unable to see anything but the gout of flame in the thick smoke.

* * *

In the APC, Castle and Beckett watched Frost's monitor go black as his bio-readouts spiked then flat-lined. Nearly every screen showed glimpses, shimmering infrared silhouettes of the aliens, the images bobbing and panning confusedly in a chaotic riot of violent movement.

"Let's rock!" Vasquez shouted, and the two smart-gunners opened up simultaneously, lighting up the smoke filled room with the loud, staccato chatter of heavy weapons fire.

"Who's firing?" Gorman called out, but nobody was listening, "I ordered a hold fire, dammit!"

* * *

Vasquez ripped off her headset, her eyes riveted to the targeting screen of her Smart-gun, as she targeted and fired. Thunder and lightning flaring from her smart-gun, speaking death for any alien within her range of vision. Aliens screamed their loud, high pitched screams as she cut them down with ruthless efficiency.

* * *

Kate flinched as another human scream ripped out over the open frequency as one by one the screens denoting troopers went dark.

Gorman's face was ashen. He was confused, completely in shock and unable to cope with how quickly the tactical situation had deteriorated. He was trying to think, trying to react, but the situation was unfolding too rapidly for him to keep track. He was simply too inexperienced to cope with the scene unfolding before him.

"Gorman, get them out of there!" Kate shouted, " _ **Do**_ something!"

"Shut up!" Gorman shouted, "Just shut up!"

Two more screens went dark before Gorman found his voice.

"Uh,...Apone, I want you to lay down a suppressing fire with the incinerators and fall back by squads to the APC, over."

"Say again?" Apone asked through the static, "All after incinerators?"

Kate and Rick watched helplessly as the situation fell apart. It was clear that Gorman was completely out of his depth. The creatures were attacking and Marines were dying down there. Gorman was losing it and there was not time to waste while he struggled.

* * *

Apone adjusted his headset, tapping the earpiece, trying in vain to hear the lieutenant's orders, but communications were too garbled.

" ...lay down ...by squads to..." was all he got back before comms completely broke down into a riot of static and a scream broke the air demanding Apone's attention. He was on his own, but his training and experience made up the difference.

""Hudson? Crowe?" Apone called out, "Sound off! Wierzbowski?" but he heared nothing but footsteps behind him. He spun around, leading with his flame unit and almost opened up on Hudson.

"We're getting our asses kicked Sarge!" Hudson shouted, completely freaked out, "We're all gonna die down here!"

"Apone reached into the bag at his shoulder and handed him a magazine, which Hudson slapped home, looking truly terrified, but feeling a little better now that he was fully re-armed.

"Yeah. Right. Right!" Apone shouted, slapping home a magazine into his own pulse rifle and opening up a burst into the nearest of the drones. "Fuck it. Light em up people!"

Apone never saw the Alien who got him and draggend him back into the darkness.

Vasquez, stood her ground near the exit from whence they came, laying down a horrendous field of fire almost mechanically. Controlled bursts, selecting her targets with care, one with the smart-gun affixed to her armor wiping clean a killbox before setting herself another.

* * *

Castle, Beckett and Vaughn watched helplessly as Apone's monitor spun wildly and went dark. Gorman was spinning out himself, on his way to complete vapor lock.

"I told them to fall back..." Gorman whispered helplessly, unable to fathom why the op had unfolded like he thought it should.

"They're cut off!" Kate shouted viciously, "Do something!"

But her angry outburst fell on deaf ears. Kate knew it had come down to her to do what Gorman could not. She would have to act or watch them all die. She struggled for only half a heartbeat about what to do, terrified... but more than that, furious. Her rage galvanized her enough to leap beyond her fear and do what she knew needed to be done. She shouldered past the paralyzed Gorman she ran up the aisle o to the driver's seat, unseating the driver and taking the controls.

"Newt, strap in!" She shouted as she fired up the unfamiliar vehicle.

"Beckett!" Gorman shouted, "what the hell...?"

But she ignored him and threw the APC into gear, sending the drive wheels spinning on the wet ground before the massive machine leaped forward, sending Gorman sprawling.

Kate checked the forward monitor at the smoke pouring out of the complex ahead and swerved right, sending the APC skidding onto the descending ramp-way before accelerating hard down into the complex.

Gorman rose from the floor and lunged at Kate, trying to dislodge her from the driver's seat.

"What are you doing?" Gorman shouted shrilly, "Turn around! That's an order!"

He clawed at her, hysterically, but Castle rose behind him like an avenging angel spun him about and folded him over with a single punch to the midsection.

"Go Beckett!" he shouted, hauling the Lieutenant out of the driving compartment and back into the crew bay, throwing him to the floor and giving the man not another stray thought.

* * *

The APC roared down into the smoky structure, tearing away outcroppings of alien-encrustation as it went. Kate hit the floodlights, homing in on the smoke ahead. Lighting the way for the Marines, giving them an escape route to make for as she pulled the APC up broadside to the stairwell.

Castle stopped on his way to the door to retrieve the case prepared for him by his stepmother. He flipped it open to reveal the second pulse rifle from the Narcissus, the twin of the one he had killed the original xenomorph with seemingly a lifetime ago. Castle grinned darkly, as he picked up a magazine from the box, slapped it home and pulled back the charging lever on his way to the crew door.

Drake and Vasquez backed out of the dense mist, firing as they fall back, Hudson between them until they reached Esposito and Ryan's position.

"Marines, we are leaving!" Espo roared over the smart-guns' chatter.

He slapped Vasquez on the shoulder, then Drake to get their attention.

"Suppressing fire!" He ordered, they nod as they aim down the corridor and open up a renewed barrage into the darkness. "Ryan, Hudson, fall back to the top of the stairwell! We'll cover Vasquez and Drake when they fall back!"

Hudson and Ryan nod, then fell back up the stairwell taking them ten paces from the waiting APC. From the top of the stairs, they opened up over the Smart-gunners shoulders as Vasquez and Drake turned and ran up the stairs.

Drake turned to send one last burst down the stairs before his smart-gun went dry. Without skipping a beat, he slapped the buckles to cut loose his harness and unslung a flame thrower, while Vasquez continued to hammer away with her own smart-gun.

The first Alien cleared the stairwell, only for it's head to explode in a mist of green acid. When Vasquez spun around, she saw Castle at the door of the APC, firing with a level of precision she would not have expected of the civilian a few hours before. What she saw behind the APC, however, turned her blood to ice.

Espo and Ryan turned as one and opened up with bursts from their own rifles, clearing the APC as they reached the door. Ryan shoved Hudson and Castle in ahead of him and leaped in as Espo dragged Vasquez inside, smart-gun harness and all. She saw the dark shape of one of the alien drones and opened up with a full burst, scoring a clean body hit, blowing open the thing's thorax.

A spray of greenish yellow acid slashed across Drake's face and chest, eating into his skin and bone like a hot knife through butter. He collapsed, reflexively triggering his flamethrower. The jet of liquid fire arced as he fell, engulfing the three aliens who had reached the back half of the APC.

Vasquez rolled aside as a gout of napalm also shot through the crew-door, setting the interior ceiling on fire. Before Espo could get the door fully closed, Vasquez lunged, clawing at the door, but he dragged her back inside.

"Drake!" Vasquez screamed, all sense gone in the face of Drake's loss, "He's down!"

"He's gone, Vasquez!" Espo shouted at her, "You can't help him, he's gone!"

But Vasquez was irrational, unable to let go of the only man who would ever "get" her. They were partners, reason was lost upon her.

"No.. No," She cried out, tears streaming, "he's not. He's -" and kept trying to get back out the door.

It took Castle, Ryan and Vaughn combined to drag her inside as Espo relieved her of the near empty smart-gun.

"Beckett, Let's go!" Espo shouted, pounding on the front wall of the crew compartment.

Kate jammed the APC into reverse and hit the throttle. The APC roared backward up the ramp, the sudden movement burying Hudson under a pile of equipment as a storage rack broke free. Esposito almost got the door closed, but four six inch claws appeared at the edge. Even against the combined efforts of Espo, Vaughn and Vasquez, the door is slowly wrenched open.

"Get on the Goddamn door!" Espo yelled at the paralyzed Gorman, who backed away, eyes wide. Castle turned around and raised his pulse rifle at the alien head trying to wriggle through the opening, jammed the barrel between its jaws and pulled the trigger six times.

The creature was flung backward, its shattered head fountaining acid blood. The spray ate into the door, the deck, and a small spatter hit Hudson on the arm. He shrieked as Castle and Espo slid the door home and finally dogged it tight.

Kate's hands moved seemingly without conscious will, working the control column and manhandling the accelerator, turning the machine hard, the wheels crushing the heads of more than one xenomorph under their relentless tread. Everyone inside the machine was shouting or cursing, holding on to anything they can to remain standing while trying to put out the fire.

Something landed on the roof of the APC with a metallic clang, making Newt shriek with fright and slip from her seat to bury herself as close to Kate as she could get.

* * *

Meanwhile, Gorman had plastered himself against a wall, as far from the door as possible, but the small escape hatch behind him is ripped away and a massive hand snatches at him from the opening. He disappears halfway through it with a shriek of surprise and terror, his legs kicking. The alien pulls at him, clinging to the roof, only one arm slid inside the vehicle. It's tail whipped into the opening like a scorpion, burying a four inch stinger into his shoulder to still his struggling.

Esposito lunged for the fire control console as Castle tried to line up a shot, only to find his weapon fouled by the acid from his last kill. On the roof the alien looked up at the sound of servo-motors whirring. Under Espo's control, the top mounted 20mm chain-gun snapped around and opened up with a ten round burst, tearing its upper torso to pieces. Gorman's unconscious form is dragged back inside the alien's hand still clutching his collar, trailing the entire arm to the shoulder. Sickened, Espo kicked it aside.

* * *

The APC was swiftly becoming less and less responsive to Kate's commands as more and more of the acid found its way into the wheel wells and leached into the steering gear. She fought the controls as the big machine slewed, but still roared forward. Smashing over one abomination after another the machine thundered out of the massive structure and back out onto the causeway toward the colony outpost.

Everyone in the crew compartment still conscious could hear the grinding and shrieking of rending metal coming from the drive train and all of them knew it meant the tank would not get them all the way back to the colony. Castle was the first to move, slipping into the driver's compartment behind Kate, he covered her white knuckled hand on the throttle lever with his own and carefully eased it back.

"It's okay, babe...we're clear," Castle whispered in her ear. "Ease up."

The grinding of metal became more pronounced as the vehicle slowed while Castle talked Kate down.

"Kate, let go..." he pleads in her ear, "the transaxle is blown, you're just grinding metal."

The APC finally ground to a halt halfway between the atmosphere processing station and the colony, a charred, smoking, acid-scarred mess.

"Newt?" Castle called out, breaking Kate out of her own spell "Where's Newt?"

Castle felt a tug at his pants leg and looked down to find Newt wedged into a narrow space between the driver's seat and the bulkhead, trembling and terrified as she held out her arms for him. At her silent plea he lifted her from her hiding place, cradling the child in his arms, her head tucked under his chin.

"You okay?"

Newt nodded under his chin. Castle took Kate's hand, helped her out of the driver's seat and lead her back to the crew compartment.

Hudson was holding his arm, staring in stunned dismay at nothing, the horror of the past hour running rampant through his mind.

"Jesus...Jesus... What the fuck!" he muttered incoherently while Vaughn tries to look at Hudson's arm.

"I'm all right," Hudson shouts angrily, jerking his arm away, "leave it!"

Kate knelt down next to Esposito, who was bent over Gorman, checking for a pulse.

"He's alive," Esposito responded dully, "that last one stuck him with something... I think he's paralyzed."

"He's fucking dead!" Vasquez shouted, grabbing Gorman by the collar and hauling him up roughly, slapping him once in the face and shaking him roughly.

"Wake up pendejo!" She shouts, shaking him mercilessly, "I'm gonna kill you, you Goddamn worthless fuck!"

Espo was on her in a heartbeat, his hand firmly clenched around her elbow to prevent her from hitting the lieutenant again.

"Hold it, Vasquez!" He shouted, with enough steel in his voice to get through to her, "Back off, private... right now!"

Vasquez released Gorman as if burned, sending his head smacking onto the deck as she recoiled away allowing Kate to open Gorman's uniform shirt, revealing a bloodless, but heavily bruised puncture wound.

"Looks like it stung him," Kate husked to Castle, "probably how... how it had taken Captain Kim without a fight...remember?"

Castle nodded, "yeah seems reasonable."

"Hey...hey! Look," Hudson shouted, "Crowe and Apone aren't dead, man!"

Everyone turned to see Hudson staring at the MTOB monitors, gesticulating wildly at the bio-function screens.

"Must be stung... like Gorman." Hudson muttered, "Their signs are real low but they ain't dead!"

"You can't help them." Kate whispered, not liking what she's saying any more than the Marines, her oath to serve and protect not forgotten because she wasn't a cop anymore. "Right now, they're being cocooned just like the others."

"Oh, God. Jesus," Hudson muttered, "This ain't happening, man."

Kate and Vasquez locked eyes, both recalling the younger woman's bravado back on the Sulaco only a day before though Kate steadfastly refused to say it, _"I told you so_ " hung in the air between them. Vasquez turned away first this time, unable to match Kate's gaze. For the first time recognizing the depth of the situation.

* * *

Spunkmeyer emerged, crossing the Tarmac to the loading ramp of the drop-ship. As he neared the top of the ramp, his boot slipped... skidding on something wet. Kneeling, he touched a small puddle of thick slime. He shrugged, and hit the controls to retract the ramp and closed the doors.

* * *

"I say we break out the canisters of CN-20," Vasquez muttered angrily, "roll em down there and nerve gas the whole fucking nest."

"Look, man," Hudson interjected, clearly freaked out, "let's just bug out and call it even, okay?"

"That's no good," Kate replied to Vasquez, completely ignoring Hudson, hoping he'd calm down, "There's no way to know it'll have any effect their biochemistry. I say we call in the drop-ship, bug out and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

"Now hold on just a damn minute," Vaughn interrupted, not liking where this conversation was headed "there is no way I'm authorizing an action that extreme."

"Why not?" Kate replied, for once with Vasquez' full support.

Vaughn sensed the challenge in her tone, this wasn't the numb, traumatized woman he'd met back on Gateway, whom he'd been certain he could keep under his thumb, this Kate Beckett was a different animal altogether. He backpedaled quickly, suddenly becoming more conciliatory, which had always worked with her before.

"I know this is an emotional moment," Vaughn tried again, "but let's not make snap judgments. For starters, this installation had a substantial dollar value attached to it..."

"They can fucking _bill_ me, Kate interrupted angrily, for the first time seeing what a manipulative bastard he was. "What else?"

"This is clearly an important species we're dealing with here," Vaughn began, not realizing how big a mistake he was making until he was in too deep. "We can't just arbitrarily exterminate them..."

"Bullshit!" Castle and Beckett exclaimed in unison. For the first time on the same page when it came to Eric Vaughn.

"Yeah, bullshit!" Vasquez agreed readily, liking Kate's idea, "Watch us, pendejo!"

"Maybe you haven't been keeping up on current events," Hudson interjected, "but we just got our asses kicked, pal!"

Kate looked Vaughn square in the eye, like she would have a murder suspect in the box, clearly not pleased and making Vaughn increasingly nervous at the scrutiny.

"Vaughn, We had an agreement." Kate hissed dangerously.

Vaughn took her aside from the others and lowered his voice, clearly not wanting this conversation public.

"I know, I know," He began, "but we're dealing with changing scenarios here. This thing is major, Kate, I mean _really_ major. If we can bring a specimen back, as the company employee who discovered this species your percentage could amount to some serious money."

That was completely the wrong thing to say.

Kate stared at him like he was a particularly disagreeable fungus, disgusted at finally discovering the man he really was and what really mattered to him. That he had been manipulating her all along. That she had very nearly sided against the man she loved to keep him from looking for his daughter because Vaughn had been a sympathetic ear when she'd been vulnerable. He'd only been willing to listen, because she was a means to an end. An asset to be used and tossed aside.

"You son of a bitch," Kate hissed, "You wanted these things all along."

"Don't make me pull rank, Kate," Vaughn warned, his voice becoming dangerous. Little did he know that this was strike three.

"What rank?" Kate spat back, "I believe Sergeant Esposito is the man with authority here."

"Sergeant Esposito?" Vaughn repeated, almost contemptuously.

"This operation is under military jurisdiction and Espo here is next in chain of command. Right?"

"Looks that way." Esposito said.

"Look, this is a multi-billion dollar operation." Vaughn complained, "He can't make that kind of decision. He's just a grunt!"

Vaughn paused long enough to look at Esposito, "No offense."

"None taken," Esposito replied coldly, eyeing Vaughn like something he'd scraped from his combat boots, then tapped his comm headset,. "Op six to Ferro, you copy?"

"Standing by," Ferro replied over the line almost immediately.

"Have Bishop and Dietrich prep their patient for evac to the Sulaco, then prep for dust-off. We need an immediate evac. We're getting out of here, Op-six out."

Esposito turned back to Vaughn and pinned him with a glare. Making it perfectly clear he valued Beckett and Castle's opinion over the company company suit.

"Mr. Vaughn, upon further reflection and considering the input from the only available experts on this hostile organism, it is clear to me that our only viable option is to get off this rock and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure to wipe out the infestation. Like you told Lieutenant Gorman earlier, it's insured."

Espo winked at Beckett, but Vaughn looked like Espo had slapped him in the face.

"This is bullshit!" Vaughn exclaimed. "You don't have the authority to over-ride..."

The sound of a pulse rifle's charging lever being pulled cut Vaughn off mid- rant. Vasquez held the pulse-rifle in question cradled, in her arm. It wasn't pointed at Vaughn, but her expression left little to the company suit's limited imagination what threat she posed. It was clear from the rifle in Hudson's hands as well that he was in a very bad bargaining position. The discussion was over.

"Don't worry, honey," Castle whispered into Newt's ear before setting her down on her feet, "We're taking you and your mother home."

With that, the group filed out of the wrecked personnel carrier, Esposito and Hudson carrying Gorman between them, the others close behind to watch the drop ship roar in on its final approach.

* * *

The drop ship rose above the small wind-storm kicked up by the down-blast of its VTOL jets, as it hovered above the complex like a huge insect as it's searchlights snapped on in the waning daylight and dropped it's nose to move forward along the causeway to seek out the damaged APC.

In the drop ship's cockpit, Ferro clicked the intercom switch several times, trying to reach Spunkmeyer.

"Spunkmeyer?" She calls out on the intercom, "Goddammit, where the hell are you?"

The compartment door behind her slid slowly open and the pilot turned toward it to yell at him,.

"Where the fu..."

It wasn't Spunkmeyer.

Her eyes widened as the words died in her throat, the last thing Lt. Ferro would ever see was the second set of jaws extending from the first at her as the alien jumped her. With a whirl of motion and a truncated scream, her body jerked, shoving the throttles and attitude controls violently forward. Ferro's last act among the living had signed both hers and the alien drone's death warrants.

* * *

Castle, Beckett and the others looked on in horror as the approaching ship dipped violently and veersed off course. Its main engines whined at full power as the craft accelerated and lost altitude. It clipped a rock formation and cartwheeled end over end, narrowly missing the APC before crashing headlong into the processing station with a violent explosion.

Everyone watched as their hopes of getting off the planet, not to mention the lion's share of their offensive firepower was reduced to a flaming wreck in the distance. After a moment of stunned silence, Hudson was the first to give words to their plight.

"Well that's great! That's just fucking great, man," Hudson whined hysterically, "Now what the fuck are we supposed to do, man? We're in some real pretty shit now!

"Are you about finished?" Espo shouted.

Everyone seemed to be caught up in the emotion of the moment, not even Kate was able to disguise her stricken expression at the destruction of their ride out of this hellhole. Except, that is, for Newt. The little girl seemed almost deathly calm as she shrugged with more fatalistic acceptance than a child her age should possess.

"I guess this means we're not leaving, right?" Newt asked, looking up at Castle.

"I'm sorry, Newt." Castle whispered.

"You don't have to be sorry." Newt whispered back, her small hand squeezing her grandfather's gently. "It's not your fault."

Hudson seemed to taking their predicament the hardest, his affable happy-go-lucky nature obviously a mask for some serious insecurities. Issues much easier to hide with a platoon of Marines at his back. With that support system now torn asunder, he was the one cast adrift.

"Just tell me what the fuck we're supposed to do now." He moaned, "What're we gonna do now?"

"Maybe could build a fire and sing songs." Vaughn muttered sarcastically.

Nobody was looking to him for suggestions anymore, serious or otherwise. Even Beckett had shed her trust of the man, and he was just now coming to that realization and it troubled him greatly. If he wanted to get out from under this thing, he knew he would have to accelerate his own plans and quickly.

Of all of them, the one who seemed the most put together was the one nobody expected. Newt looked nervous and not a little frightened, but she seemed to have a much better grasp of the situation than Hudson. She'd learned the hard way over the last few months that panic would not help her.

It was getting dark, and the monsters always came at night. Before her Grandfather and Kate and the Marines came, she'd made a point of shutting the alcove tight, making herself very small and very quiet at night, huddled against her mother's side as she listened to them scratch and claw as they searched the colony. Nighttime belonged to _them_. It was not a good time for Marines, or little girls to be outside.

"We should get back, Poppa Rick," She said quietly, betraying little emotion, "'It'll be dark soon and they mostly come at night. Mostly."

Rick and Kate each took one of Newt's hands and walked a few paces away from the APC, looking at the atmosphere processing station looming in the twilight, the burning drop-ship wreckage jammed into its foundation in the bedrock. Until it burned out, it was likely the only distraction from the aliens they were likely to get while they salvaged what they could and made the long walk back to the colony proper.

The xenomorph drones would scurry like ants to repair their nest and secret off the new hosts that they had acquired, but the two of them knew as well as Newt that they would be back soon, within the next day or so. They were well aware of how relentless the alien drones were.

"All right everybody," Esposito ordered, "we got a lot of work to do and a short time to get it done. We need to salvage what we can from the APC and get the hell out of here. Saddle up children, we've got a long walk ahead of us. Let's move!"

* * *

 _ ****Author's note** Happy Halloween everybody! Oh what a pickle our dynamic duo find themselves in, isn't it?**_

 _ **On a side note, it has been brought to my attention that there**_ _ **is a nasty little pack of trolls wandering around the site again - several fanfic writers have to various degrees experienced their bullshit in the last couple of days. It has been suggested that we writers engage in a bit of coordinated messaging from the grownups on here. So here goes.**_

 ** _To the trolls in question:_**

 _ **If you wanna come at me, go right the hell ahead, I'll simply delete your review, ignore you like the silly, pathetic childish creatures you are and move on. Basically, we're all bored with your attention seeking over-amped, unhelpful vitriol .**_

 _ **I don't expect reviewers to blow sunshine up my ass, mind you, but I would greatly appreciate it if you pathetic cowardly whiners would grow up, grow a pair and learn how to critique properly if you really want to be taken seriously.**_

 _ **That is all. Once again, Happy Halloween!**_


	7. Barbarians At the Gate

**Chapter Seven  
Barbarians At The Gate**

* * *

" _Oh give me mercy for my dreams  
'Cause every confrontation seems to tell me  
What it really means  
To be this lonely sailor  
And when the sky begins to clear  
The sun it melts away my fear  
And I shed a silent weary tear  
For those who mean to love me"_

Ready For The Storm: Rich Mullins

* * *

The weary and demoralized group gathered in operations to take stock of their grim options. Vasquez, Castle and Hudson had just set down the last of the scorched and dented packing cases culled from the APC, which Bishop and Vasquez had dragged back with one of the heavier trucks left in the motor pool to replace the two heavy tractors blocking the main entrance.

Esposito indicated their remaining inventory of weapons, lying on a table with a flick of his wrist.

"This is all we could salvage. We've got six pulse-rifles with about fifty rounds each. Not so good. About fifteen M-40 grenades, enough to reload each rifle once, and two flame throwers less than half full...one damaged which we can cannibalize to get a single working one."

Newt reached out curiously for one of the grenades, but Ryan, snatched it out of her reach.

"Don't touch that, honey, it's dangerous okay?" Ryan whispered, suddenly reminded of Sarah Grace when she was that young, not wanting to think that his own little girl would be discovering boys soon. He winked at Newt and lowered his helmet onto her head with a wry grin, earning a smile from her as she struggled to keep the helmet on her head, the grenade completely forgotten.

"We've also got four robot-sentry units with scanners and display capacity, three are intact, we'll use its ammo to fully reload the pulse rifles." Esposito continued, after rolling his eyes at Ryan's antics. He opened one of the scorched cases to reveal one of the high-tech servo-actuated machine guns.

"We can cross connect the sensor package from the broken one to the APC's chain gun targeting system to hold the main entrance and set the others up at strategic choke points. They might just be the force multiplier we need to hold out. If nothing else, they'll warn us if our new friends come knocking.

"How long after we're declared overdue can we expect a rescue?" Castle asked.

"With our drop-ship and APC down for the count, we don't have a comm array strong enough to penetrate the atmosphere," Esposito replied, "Captain Gates will declare us officially missing in about three days. The way things stand right now, with nobody left aboard who can pilot the other drop ship in those storms, it will likely be about seventeen days before any help can arrive."

"Seventeen days?" Hudson whined, "we're not gonna last seventeen hours! Those things are gonna come in here just like they did before, man... they're gonna get us long before..."

"Hudson!" Kate spat harshly, "This little _girl_ survived longer than that with no weapons and no training." Kate nodded at Newt, her tiny head swimming in Ryan's helmet, who saluted Hudson smartly.

"Well maybe we should put her in charge!" Hudson spat back.

"Look, Hudson, you've had your little pity party," Kate snapped, "but this is the tactical situation and you better just start dealing with it... because we need you and I'm sick and tired of your bullshit."

Kate waved her hand around the operations center, then pointed at Hudson and Ryan, clearly taking charge of the situation.

"I want you and Ryan to get back on those terminals and call up some floor plans. Check the construction blueprints, maintenance schematics, anything that shows the layout of this place. I want to see air ducts, electrical access tunnels, subbasements, every possible way into or out of this wing big enough for those things to fit through."

Hudson looked over to Esposito, who nodded, quietly acknowledging Kate as a civilian authority and giving his assent to her plan of action. Hudson shrugged his shoulders and gathered himself, thankful for something to do.

"A-firmative," he stated grimly, "We're on it."

Ryan slapped Hudson's shoulder and the two of them turned back toward the terminals they had abandoned earlier in the day.

"Kate, you and Espo seem to have things firmly in hand here," Castle said, nodding at Newt, who was clearly fascinated with everything going on in operations, then met Kate's eyes again, "I'm gonna go see how things are progressing in medical."

"Okay, give Alexis a kiss for me too, babe," Kate whispered with a quick peck to Rick's lips while Newt was distracted by what Ryan was doing.

When Castle stepped into the infirmary, it was clear something had changed. The auto-doc platform was cycled out and lay empty with neither Bishop nor Dietrich anywhere to be seen. Castle's penchant for the worst case scenario went into overdrive, his imagination filled with screeching aliens and blood on the walls. He paced the room, images of doom clouding his thoughts until Dietrich emerged from one of the patient isolation rooms. Castle was on her within seconds.

"Where's my daughter? Is she okay? Please tell me where she is!" Castle pressed in a panic.

"Mr. Castle," Dietrich said, falling back on military formality, "Please come with me, sir."

When they walked into the patient room, Castle relaxed at the sight of his daughter lying in the bed, resting.

"As I said before, sir," Dietrich said, "it was a very near thing. We got to her just in time. She isn't one hundred percent, and I'll feel better when we can get her back to the Sulaco so Dr. Parish can give her a full workup, but she should make a full recovery."

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" Castle exclaimed, tears pricking his eyes.

Dietrich was completely unprepared to be swallowed up in the full bear hug Castle hit her with. It took her a moment to recover from the shock of it to stiffly pat him on the back twice before he let her go. Even then, she wobbled on her feet from the force of it, noting that he was a much bigger, stronger man than any of them had given him credit for.

Castle grabbed a chair and pulled it up to the bed, taking Alexis' hand in one of his as he ran his fingers through her terra cotta locks, sweeping her bangs from her forehead and planting a kiss there. She was twelve years older than he remembered, and far older than the child in his mind's eye, but this was still his little girl, and he felt keenly the guilt that she'd been hurt because he hadn't been there to protect her from the monsters.

"Daddy?" Alexis' voice was a hushed whisper, like she wasn't sure he was real.

"Yes pumpkin, I'm here." Castle whispered.

"Where's Rebecca?" Alexis asked, her voice increasing in pitch with the panic only a mother could feel when her child was missing. She tried to rise from the bed, eyes growing wide, "Where's my daughter?"

"Shh," Castle soothed, easing her back into the bed, "It's okay, she's with Kate, Ryan and Esposito in operations, she's safe enough."

With assurances she would only have accepted from her father, Alexis sank into his embrace as her arms wrapped around his neck and she began to break down, sobbing in his arms.

"I thought you were dead... everybody thought you were dead," Alexis whispered between sobs, "Grams died...and... there was nobody to chase the monsters away..." Alexis completely fell apart, likely for the first time in years, as she trailed off into heartbreaking sobs against his broad chest.

"I know, pumpkin, I know. I'm so sorry," Castle whispered, running his fingers through her hair and rubbing her back, doing what he could to soothe the hurt he couldn't help but feel he had caused, heartbreak his daughter had been carrying around for over a decade. "I'm here, Alexis, I'm here. I've got you."

Though his heart broke for Alexis and everything she'd been through while he was gone, something in Castle hardened. A deep darkness in his soul that only surged within him when his child was in danger bubbled to the surface. A darkness he'd only ever witnessed in men like Jerry Tyson, Scott Dunn... and his father which he had worked his entire life to purge through his novels. A side of himself he had never wanted Kate or anyone else to see, which he was both ashamed and afraid of. The side of him that could torture, maim and kill without remorse, which he only let out of its box to protect his own.

These things had nearly killed his little girl, traumatized his granddaughter, threatened his family and he would live to see them exterminated. To that end he would give in to that darkness in the depth of his soul gladly and God help anybody who got in his way.

* * *

Back in Operations, Kate, Vaughn, Hudson, Ryan and Esposito stood around the map table while Hudson once again paged through the schematics of the facility, while Newt hopped from one foot to the other trying to see what was going on.

"This service tunnel must be how they're moving back and forth." Kate said, pointing to a spot on the screen.

"Yeah," Ryan replied, "according to the records it was part of the original underground complex before the atmosphere was stabilized. Back then, it was the only way to get from operations to the processing station without pressure suits." He traced a finger along the abstract ground plan for emphasis. "It runs from the processing station right into the sub-level of the operations building, right here."

"All right," Kate replied, "There's a fire door at this end. The first thing we do is set up a remote sentry gun in the tunnel and seal the door from this side.

"We gotta figure on them getting into the complex, though," Esposito added.

"That's right," Kate agreed, "So we re-secure the barricades at these intersections," She pointed at the intersections she had in mind on the schematic, "...and seal these ducts here and here to funnel them down these two corridors and set up the other two sentry guns here and here to nail the coffin shut."

Esposito noted where Kate suggested for the sentry units' deployment and contemplated her game plan, satisfied that it was sound.

"Outstanding," Esposito stated, finally seeing the Kate Beckett he remembered, the woman he'd have followed into hell once upon a time. "All we need now is a deck of cards."

He turned to the others in the room before issuing orders, "All right, time's wasting let's move like we got a purpose."

"A-firmative." Hudson replied, saluting smartly before he, Ryan and Vasquez turned to go to work.

"A-firmative!" Newt copied, holding Ryanm's helmet on her head with her left hand as she saluted with her right. Esposito winked and snapped to full attention to salute back smartly before getting to work.

* * *

On the other side of the fire door leading to the access tunnel, Vasquez had just finished setting up the first sentry gun. The tunnel was rather narrow, just wide enough for two people to walk through comfortably. It was lined with conduits, and even when lit seemed to go on forever. The heavy tripod of the sentry gun took up nearly the whole width of the tunnel with just enough room on either side for the weapon to traverse left and right.

"Fire in the hole!" Vasquez shouted as she threw a wastebasket down the tunnel into the gun's programmed field of fire. The sentry gun swiveled smoothly allowing the wastebasket to bounce once then promptly riddled it with two quick bursts of exploding ten millimeter rounds, reducing the wastebasket to dime-sized shrapnel.

Vasquez switched out the ammo drum with the full one from the damaged sentry gun, then retreated behind the heavy steel fire door and hit the button to roll it closed on its track. She set down the ammo drum and began sealing the door to its frame with a portable welding torch as Esposito paced nervously until Hudson came on his headset.

"A and B sentries are in place and keyed," Hudson reported.

"Vasquez is sealing the tunnel," Espo replied, get the barricades the colonists used re-sealed then report back to operations."

Castle and Beckett were hard at work covering the last of a series of air duct openings with metal plates scrounged from the vehicles outside and welding them in place, showering sparks in the dark corridor.

Behind them Vaughn and Newt were occupied moving back and forth with a hand truck, stacking packages of food in the operations center.

When everything seemed to be ready, Esposito approached them and handed Castle and Beckett each a set of portable tracking beacons about the size and shape of wristwatches.

"Here, put these on," Esposito said, "we all have them. This way I can I can locate you anywhere

in the complex on this," He indicated a tiny tracker hooked to his battle harness and shrugged, self-consciously. "I have ones for little Castle and mini-little Castle, too."

Kate paused for a moment, regarding him quizzically, before strapping hers on and handing the others to Castle.

"Thanks, Javi," she whispered.

* * *

Two hours later, Castle carried an exhausted, but defiantly awake Newt through the interconnected rooms of the medical wing with Kate following right behind. Newt had cried herself out after a tearful reunion with her mother, but Alexis had insisted she stay with him and Kate for her own safety, obviously not trusting herself to keep her daughter out of danger. Both Rick and Kate hurt for Alexis, knowing how deeply she internalized things, blaming herself for circumstances which she'd had no control over.

They reached an operating room they had claimed for themselves for some privacy. The room was small but sturdy. Three metal cots had been set up, displacing O.R. equipment which had been shoved into one corner. Newt's head was resting on Castle's shoulder, barely awake as Kate turned down the blankets on one of the cots and Castle laid her down to tuck her in.

"You're exhausted, Newt, you need to get some sleep." Castle whispered.

"I don't want to," Newt moaned, her eyes wide in fear, "I have scary dreams."

Kate could feel the fear rippling off the girl, even from the other side of the cot before she knelt down next to her, inspecting Casey in her hand.

"I'll bet Casey here doesn't have bad dreams." Kate whispered, lifting the doll's head from Newt's tiny fingers to look inside, before handing her back. "Nothing bad in there. Maybe you could just try to be like her."

Newt rolled her eyes, clearly mimicking Kate. "Kate, ...she doesn't have bad dreams because she's just piece of plastic," a little bit of Castle smart-ass shining through her weariness and fear.

"Oh. Sorry, Newt." Kate replied, feigning being chastened.

"Mommy always told me that there were no monsters." Newt whispered, "No real ones. But there are. I've seen them. They hurt her."

Kate's expression sobered as she turned to Castle, her eyes saying _"fix it, fix it, please"_ through her dampening eyelashes as she brushed Newt's hair back from her forehead.

"Yes, there are," Castle replied quietly, refusing to lie to her.

"Why would mommy lie to me like that?" Newt whispered, a deep undercurrent of betrayal in her tone.

"Most of the time, it's true," Castle replied, "It was when I told her that when she was as little as you."

His heart sank like a stone with the knowledge that his granddaughter had witnessed firsthand how terrifying the real world could be. That Newt's childhood had been scarred forever by nightmare creatures far scarier than anything a child's subconscious should be able to manufacture. He could tell that Kate felt it too, as she buried her face in his shoulder to hide her tears, with the knowledge that there was nothing that could ever set this right for her.

He knew that Kate had been plagued by similar nightmares, centered around events that took place after he'd been incapacitated by Ash which he had no knowledge of, events she swore she could not remember, and he believed her. That he had been unable to stand with her when she'd needed him most magnified his guilt exponentially.

"Does my mommy have one of those things inside her?" Newt asked.

Castle pulled the blankets up, tucking them in around her tiny body. "No, Newt, Private Dietrich looked and so did the auto-doc. Kate and I know what to look for and there isn't one there. I promise."

Castle reached for a portable space heater sitting nearby, slid it closer to the bed and switched it on. It hummed as it warmed up, gradually emitting a cozy orange glow.

"Kate and I are going to go check on your mommy," Castle whispered in her ear, "make sure she's comfy and safe, then we need to talk to Ryan and Esposito. We will be right in the next room, okay?"

Castle switched off the light and started to rise, but Newt grabbed his arm.

"Don't go!" Newt begged, her voice a plaintive thing in the dark "Please."

"We'll be right in the other room, Newt, I promise," Castle whispered, "I'll be able to see you on that camera right up there."

Castle pointed to the security camera over the door, watching as Newt noted the red light, indicating it was active. He took out one of the tracking bracelets given to them by Esposito and wrapped it around Newt's tiny wrist, cinching it down so it wouldn't fall off. "I can find you anywhere with this." he whispered in her ear. "But would it help if I check for monsters before I go," Castle asked, "just like I did for your mommy?"

Newt nodded and watched as Castle dipped low, even though his knee screamed in protest and looked carefully under the bed. Then set Kate to checking behind everything in the room.

"Nope, no monsters under there," Castle promised, "Now go to sleep...and try not to dream."

Newt rolled onto her side, hugging Casey, gazing at the hypnotically pulsing function light on the bracelet and listening to the space heater humming comfortingly nearby until she finally succumbed to sleep, before Castle and Beckett slipped quietly from the room.

* * *

A short time later, after Castle had painstakingly searched for monsters under Alexis' bed like he'd done for Newt, Castle and Beckett walked through medical and stopped to watch Bishop and Dietrich as they were bent over Gorman. The lieutenant's eyelids were wide open like those of a corpse, but his eyes were very much alive, tracking erratically. The only sign he was in there.

"How is he?" Kate asked, standing over Gorman, lying motionless on the examination table.

Bishop looked up from his instruments nearby, the light of a single goose-neck lamp giving his features a macabre cast as he exchanged looks with the Marine Corpsman.

"I've isolated the neuro-muscular toxin responsible for his paralysis. It seems to be metabolizing quickly so he should wake up soon.

"Let me get this straight," Kate said, starting to build theory, "The aliens paralyzed the colonists, carried them over to the AP station and cocooned them to be hosts for more of those..." Kate stopped to point at the stasis cylinders containing the face-hugger specimens for emphasis.

"Which would mean lots of those parasites, right?" Castle added, picking up Kate's lime of reasoning almost immediately "One for each person...over three hundred at least."

"Yes, that sounds reasonable," Bishop replied, the only person they had ever met not to be taken aback by their shared brain theory building mind-meld thing.

"But these things come from eggs," Kate jumped in again, "so what's _laying_ all of these eggs?"

"We could assume a parallel to certain insect forms with similar hive-like organizations," Bishop offered. "An ant or termite colony, for example, is ruled by a single female, a queen, which is the source of all new eggs."

"You're saying one of those things lays all the eggs?" Castle asked.

"If these creatures are insect based, the queen would likely be physically much larger then the others." Bishop postulated, "A termite queen's abdomen is so bloated with eggs that it can't move at all. It is fed and tended by drone workers and defended to the death by the warriors. She is the center of their lives, quite literally the mother of their entire hive."

"Could she be intelligent?" Castle and Beckett asked simultaneously.

"Hard to say," Bishop replied, "It may merely function on blind instinct...attraction to warm places... but she did choose to incubate her eggs in the one location where we we couldn't destroy her without destroying ourselves in the process. Providing she exists, that would be an elegant sign of intelligence I think."

Both Castle and Beckett looked at each other, pondering the ramifications of Bishop's analysis.

"I want those specimens destroyed as soon as you're done with them, Bishop," Kate demanded, her voice dangerous, "No samples or traces of them get off this planet, understood?"

Bishop glanced at the creatures pulsing malevolently in their cylinders.

"Mr. Vaughn gave instructions that they were to be kept in stasis for return to the company labs," Bishop replied, "He was very specific."

From the barely controlled fury burning in Kate's irises, it was clear that she'd had just about enough of Eric Vaughn as she spun on her heel and stormed from the room, the fabric of her self-restraint tearing at the seams.

* * *

Kate tracked Vaughn down to a small observation chamber separated from the med lab by a glass partition, where she cornered him about his orders to Bishop.

"Vaughn, what part of _'those things need to be destroyed',_ do you not understand?" Kate hissed. If the corporate suit had known her as well he thought he did, he would have known how much danger he was really in. This was Kate Beckett in full on chase down her mother's killer mode. More focused even with nearly her entire family in the cross-hairs.

"Kate, those specimens would be worth _billions_ to the bio-weapons division." Vaughn shot back. "We can all come out of this as very wealthy heroes. Enough money for everybody here to be set for life."

"There's no way you're getting a dangerous organism like that past ICC quarantine." Kate spat back, anger in full bloom, "Section 22350 of the Commerce Code specifically states..."

"You've obviously done your homework, Kate," Vaughn interrupted, his tone condescending, "but they can't impound what they don't know about."

"But they will know, _Eric_." Kate shot back with venom in her tone, "From me. Just like they'll know how you were responsible for the deaths of the three hundred and eighty three colonists here!"

"Now, wait a second..." Vaughn began, but Kate cut him off, by stepping into his personal space, her hands in his lapels, pushing him against the observation window.

"You sent them to that ship!" Kate raged, her frustration and rage finding a target to focus on."I checked the colony log... the directive was dated shortly after my inquest, signed _Vaughn, Eric J_.! You sent them there and you didn't _warn_ them what they'd be walking into, you son of a bitch!"

"I couldn't be sure the creatures you described even existed at the time," Vaughn explained. "If I'd made it into a major security issue, the Administration would've stepped in and there would have been no exclusive rights for anybody! It was a bad call, Kate," he shrugged dismissively, "that's all."

Kate snapped, slamming Vaughn bodily into the glass partition so hard that it cracked the glass, sending spiderwebs flaring from the spot where Vaughn's shoulders struck it, surprising herself and him with her raw display of violence. Unlike Vulcan Simmons, however, Vaughn did not grin maniacally at her, in fact he betrayed no emotion at all, which made Kate even angrier.

"Bad call?" Kate shrieked, "Those people are dead! Three hundred and eighty three men women and children, you son of a bitch! The Commerce Commission is gonna nail your hide to the fucking wall for this when we get back and I'll be holding the hammer for them when they do. Remember your old life, Eric. Savor it, because I am going to take it all away."

Kate shoved him back once more before she stepped back, shaking, eyeing him with utter loathing, the depths of human greed far more horrific a revelation to her than any alien xenomorph.

"I expected better from you, Kate," Vaughn muttered almost sadly, "I honestly thought you would be smarter than this."

"Sorry to disappoint you." Kate hissed at him sarcastically, wondering how she could ever have believed a word that had come out of his mouth as she released him and turned away to stalk out.

Vaughn stared after her, his shoulders aching, his mind a whirl of options.

* * *

On her way back through operations, Kate heard a security alarm and broke into a run. She arrived in operations to find Hudson, Vasquez and Esposito already there.

"They're trying the tunnel." Esposito explained.

The sentry gun in the main tunnel spat short bursts of explosive tipped death, sending acid spattering in all directions, pitting the underground tunnel and seeping into the bedrock below to little effect. Then with just as little fanfare the weapon fell silent. The counter on the display reading only two hundred rounds had been expended.

"Must be pretty smart, they stopped before the ammo ran dry." Ryan quipped.

The intercom buzzed, startling them all.

"Bishop here," the synthetic began, "I'm afraid I have some bad news for you."

"Well, that's a switch." Ryan muttered sarcastically.

* * *

Everyone, including Bishop, crowded at the window twenty minutes later, intently staring out at the AP station's dim silhouette in the distance. Suddenly, a column of flame gushed upward from the complex at the base of the cone-like structure.

"That's it. See it?" Bishop pointed out. "Emergency venting."

"How long until it blows?" Kate asked, not certain she was going to like the answer.

"I'm projecting total containment failure in a little under four hours with a core breach and nuclear chain reaction equal to a ten megaton fusion bomb less than an hour after that. This facility will be well inside the projected thirty kilometer blast radius.

"We got problems," Esposito stated flatly.

"You think?" Ryan muttered.

"And it's too late to shut it down?" Kate asked.

"I'm afraid so," Bishop replied, "The crash did too much damage, a core overload is inevitable at this point."

"Oh, man," Hudson moaned, "I was gettin' short, too! Four more weeks and out. Now I'm gonna buy it on this fuckin' rock. It ain't fair, man!"

"Hudson, give it a rest," Vasquez snapped, "this kinda sucks for all of us."

They watched another gas jet light up the fog-shrouded landscape before Bishop resealed the storm shutter. Kate struggled to organize her thoughts.

"We need the other drop-ship from the Sulaco." She said finally "Can't we bring it down on remote?"

"How?" Hudson snapped at her, "Our transmitter on the APC's wasted."

"What about the colony transmitter? The up-link tower down at the other end of the complex?"

"I checked," Bishop replied, "The hard wiring between here and there was severed during the colonists fight with the aliens, it's what brought us here in the first place."

Kate paced back and forth, wracking her brain for what to do, her mind spinning out one scenario after another, before she reached the only viable alternative. "Somebody's gonna have to go out there with a portable terminal and plug in manually, then. It's the only way."

"With those things out there crawling around," Hudson snapped at her, "No way, you can count me out!"

Castle could see the wheels turning in Kate's eyes, he'd stayed silent for most of this exchange, but was about to intervene when Bishop spoke up quietly.

"I'll go." The synthetic volunteered.

"What?" Kate asked.

"I said I'll go," Bishop said, "I'm the only one qualified to remote-pilot the ship, so I'd have to go anyway. Believe me, I'd prefer not to. I may be synthetic but I'm not stupid."

"All right," Kate said, finding just a little respect for the synthetic person in spite of herself, "Let's get on it. What will you need?"

* * *

About an hour later, they had been able to find in the blueprints a sub-floor conduit leading almost directly to the up-link tower which had been exposed by acid damage from the colonists' siege. Bishop crawled into the opening, reached up for the portable terminal which Kate handed over and he pushed it into the constricted shaft ahead of him. She then handed him a small satchel containing tools and assorted patch cables, a service pistol which he promptly handed back and a small cutting torch which he slipped into the bag.

"This duct runs almost to the up-link assembly," Bishop stated coolly, "One hundred eighty meters. I estimate, say forty minutes to crawl down there. One hour to patch in and align the antenna. Thirty minutes to prep the ship, then about fifty minutes flight time."

Kate looked at her father's watch.

"It's going to be close," Kate whispered, "You better get going. The aliens should ignore you for the most part, Ash... the synthetic from my ship figured they don't see synthetics as either a threat, food source or potential host. You should be safe enough."

"See you soon," Bishop replied cheerfully as Kate lowered the curved piece of steel cut from the conduit back into place. "Watch your fingers."

He squirmed down the shaft, pushing the equipment along ahead of him, the diameter of the conduit barely larger than the width of his shoulders as Vasquez began to spot weld the conduit closed. Bishop looked back and sighed fatalistically before squirming forward once more. He had work to do.

An alarm suddenly blared through the complex, making Kate jump.

"Beckett, they're trying the main entrance." Esposito said over her headset

"On my way."

* * *

Kate sprinted for Operations with Vasquez as the loud staccato chatter from the broken APC's chain guns echoed through the whole complex. When the two women arrived, the others were gathered around the main console, mesmerized by the images from the external surveillance cameras. The muzzle flashes from the APC's chain guns lit up the darkness, revealing alien figures moving outside the complex. The chain guns hammered away, driving streamers of tracer fire into the swirling mist and an inhuman shrill screeching can be heard between bursts of thirty millimeter cannon fire.

"Twenty meters and closing," Ryan reported, "Fifteen... ten... five..."

The chain guns stopped firing abruptly, and the video image dimmed to a swirling wall of smoke. Small fires burned, glowing dimly in the mist. Black, twisted shapes and body parts scattered at the edge of visibility, but nothing else emerged and the motion sensor tone cut off.

"They retreated." Kate whispered, "The guns stopped them."

"There's got to be more to it than that," Castle added, stating the one thing nobody want to admit. "Look at the pattern, they seem to be deliberately probing the defenses, looking for weak points to exploit, there's a definite intelligence at work here."

Esposito had long since learned that absurd theories aside, Castle was pound for pound one of the best out of the box thinkers he had ever met. When it came to a menace that was a combination of an alien invasion and a zombie apocalypse, Richard Castle _would_ be the man with the plan.

"Vasquez, Hudson! I want you two walking the perimeter." Esposito ordered, "I know we're all in strung out shape but stay frosty and alert. If Castle is right, these things are smarter than they look."

"Vamos," Vasquez whispered, thumping Hudson's front armor as they head for the corridor.

Kate sighed as she picked up a cup of cold coffee, draining it in one gulp, looking more worse for wear than Castle as they leaned close together.

How long since either of you slept?" Esposito asked, "Twenty-four hours?"

Kate looked soul weary, drained by nearly forty-eight hours of nerve-wracking tension with little sleep.

"I'm not going to wind up like those others." She responded, her voice distant and detached.

"If it comes to that," Castle whispered in her ear, "I'll do us both, babe. Let's see that it doesn't"

Esposito tossed a pulse-rifle to Castle, "Here, I'd like to introduce you both to a close personal friend of mine."

He picked up another pulse-rifle, then with the casually precise movements snapped open the bolt, hit the eject lever, dropped out the magazine and handed it to Kate.

"This is the M-41A 10mm pulse-rifle," Esposito stated, "and 30mm pump-action grenade launcher."

Kate hefted the weapon, finding it heavy and awkward compared to the pistols she was used to, but, that weight also filled her a sense of security in its lethal steel lines. She raised the weapon clumsily.

"What do I do?"

* * *

Though it was clear that Castle was in his element with his own pulse rifle, having long ago mastered the civilian variant, Kate had the stock of her M-41A snugged up to her cheek awkwardly trying to keep up with Esposito's instructions. She had used her share of shotguns as a uniform, but had shied away from rifles even before she'd been shot by a sniper. Other than looking down the scope of the very rifle used to shoot her, she hadn't so much as touched one since... until now.

"Just pull it in tight." He said, aware of her hesitation and the cause of it, "It will kick some. When the counter here heads zero, hit this..." He thumbed the release button and the magazine dropped out, clattering to the floor and handed her another. "Just let it drop and get the other one in quick."

He watched as she slid the new mag in, and corrected her technique, "Just slap it in hard, lock and load."

Kate snapped back the charging lever and let it go, with an oddly reassuring "ker-chak!" as the bolt snapped back in place with a round in the pipe.

"You're ready again." Esposito encouraged, wishing he had been able to get Kate over this hump after the sniper case when he believed it might have done her the most good.

"What about the grenade launcher?" Castle asked, his own rifle at the ready.

"You probably don't want to mess with that," Espo replied.

"You started this, Javi," Kate scolded. "Now show us everything."

* * *

A short time later, Castle and Beckett walked down the corridor, carrying their newfound artillery just as Gorman stepped out of the med lab, looking weak but sound with Vaughn right behind him.

"How do you feel, Gorman?" Kate asked, pointedly ignoring Vaughn.

"All right, I guess," Gorman replied, except for one hell of a hangover."

He paused for a minute, struggling to find the right words. "Look, Beckett... I..."

"Forget it, Gorman," Kate replied, "I've been there, it's never pretty."

She shouldered past the two men into the med lab with Castle close behind. They are both far too tired for this shit.

When they disappeared down the corridor to the room they shared with Newt, Gorman turned to see Vasquez staring at him, her eyes cold spiteful cinders.

"You still want to kill me?" Gorman asked.

"It won't be necessary... _sir_ " Vasquez stated coldly, the look in her eyes told Gorman she really meant to say _"cur"_ but military protocol would not permit it. She was well aware that every set of hands would be needed on the line. If he faltered again though, she would not shed a tear if he ended up as a victim of friendly fire.

* * *

Castle and Beckett crossed the deserted lab, through the annex to the small O.R. where they had left the sleeping Newt. After stopping to check on Alexis so Castle could straighten her blankets and press a kiss to her troubled brow, they entered their darkened room and looked around but Newt had vanished. On a hunch, Kate knelt down and peered under the bed to find the girl curled up, fast asleep clutching "Casey" jammed as far back into the place Castle had deemed safe from monsters as her tiny body could reach.

Kate stared at Newt's tiny face, angelic in sleep despite the demons that haunted her dreams and waking hours equally, nightmares not substantially different from Kate's own. They had both been separated from people they loved by violence to be cast adrift during a time of great trauma. Both of them were now suffering for it, and by extension, so were the people who loved them.

Kate nodded to Castle who slipped his arms under Newt and lifted her from her hiding place without waking her, slid her onto the two cots they had pushed together for their use and curled up under the covers with the girl between them, their rifles and pistols on either side of the bed within easy reach.

Newt's face contorted and she turned in her sleep, tormented by a nightmare and crying out quietly. "Sssshh," Castle whispered, soothing Newt's fears as he had Kate's more than once, "It's all right. Shhh, I've got you." Newt gradually settled and the three of them were all soon huddled close together, fast asleep.

* * *

Bishop knelt, hunched against the base of the telemetry tower, taking shelter from the wind and rain. He was hard at work with the patch bay open and the portable terminal patched in, his jacket draped over the keyboard and monitor unit to protect them from the elements as he typed frenetically.

"Now, if I did it right..." the synthetic muttered to himself as he punched the "enable" key.

* * *

The silence of the Sulaco's empty flight deck was suddenly broken by an alert klaxon. Hydraulic motors whined to life, setting lifters into motion, moving the second drop-ship along its overhead track and into the drop bay cradle as service booms and fueling couplers moved in automatically around the hull.

On the bridge, the systems control officer jumped from her seat.

"Captain!" she sang out, "Drop ship beta is powering up and transferring to the launch cradle!"

"On who's authority?" Captain Gates replied, her eyes boring into the young ensign.

"Authorization code Bishop alpha two three niner." The ensign responded, "Retinal scan confirmed, along with a text only message from Mr. Bishop sir."

"What is the message, Ensign Sato."

"Hostile xenomorph infestation confirmed. Heavy Marine casualties sustained, Colony total loss. Atmosphere processor fusion reactor building to critical mass. Immediate evac required. Level three decontamination procedures recommended upon retrieval."

"Thank you ensign," Captain Gates responded. "Alert Dr. Parish to prepare Sick Bay for patients,"

Gates hit the direct intercom to engineering on her chair, "Mr. Sulaco, see if you can find a way to expedite the drop ship remote launch procedure."

She barely waited for his terse _"Yes, sir,"_ before switchin intercom channels to give an order that had not been needed since the time of sail, hoping it would not be necessary. "Master Chief Halsey, Sergeant Major Breckenridge, gear up and report to the flight deck ready room, full arms. Stand ready to repel possible hostile boarders. Condition one is in effect throughout the ship."

Whatever threat materialized, if any, Captain Gates was determined that the Sulaco would be ready to meet it.

* * *

 ** _**Author's Note** Things certainly seem to be coming to a head don't they?_**

 ** _Side note, Internet trolls will still not be tolerated. Learn to critique properly please or go back to obscurity._**


	8. In The Belly Of The Beast

**Chapter Eight  
In The Belly of the Beast**

* * *

" _Bright is the moon, high in starlight  
Chill in the air cold as steel tonight  
We shift, call of the wild.  
Fear in your eyes.  
It's later than you realized"_

Metallica: Of Wolf and Man.  
Written by: James Alan Hetfield, Kirk L. Hammett, Lars Ulrich

* * *

 _Newt's face contorted and she turned in her sleep, tormented by a nightmare and crying out quietly._

 _"Sssshh," Castle whispered, soothing Newt's fears as he had Kate's more than once, "It's all right. Shhh, I've got you."_

 _Newt gradually settled and the three of them were all soon huddled close together, fast asleep._

* * *

Kate woke with a start and checked her watch... three hours had passed since she'd fallen asleep, three hours blessedly free of nightmares for once. She reached out for Castle to find his side of the cot empty, blankets carefully drawn back over herself and Newt. Assuming her husband had awakened earlier to check on Alexis, she sat up, her back against the wall. Before she could disengage herself from the blankets on the cot to go find him, she saw something that stopped her cold and turned her blood to ice.

Across the room, just inside the door leading out to the med lab, sat two innocuous but chilling objects Kate recognized almost immediately. The empty stasis chambers' lids were open, their suspension fields switched off and Kate tried to forestall the wave of terror that rose within her at what those two empty pods near the door represented: Their former occupants now loose in the room waiting for their moment to strike.

"Newt," Kate whispered sharply, shaking the girl's shoulder, "Newt, wake up."

"Wah...?" Newt whispered, trying to shake the cobwebs out, "Where...?"

"Sssh. Don't move," Kate whispered. "We're in trouble."

Newt nodded, suddenly fully awake, as they listened in the darkness for the scrabble of multiple legs across the polished white floor, but only the droning of the little space heater was discernible. Kate reached along the wall behind her for the pulse rifle she'd leaned against it on her side of the bed, only to find it gone. When she rose from the bed dragging Newt behind her and turned to look, it was nowhere to be seen, along the pistol she'd carefully set on the chair nearby.

She snapped her head around just as one of the hand-shaped nightmare creatures leaped at her from the foot of the bed and ducked with a startled cry as the obscene hand shaped creature hit the wall above her, dropped to the floor and skittered back across the room with lightning speed. Kate flipped the bed against the wall, pinning the creature beneath it as she backed into the opposite corner, pushing Newt behind her. The creature writhed with incredible ferocity as it struggled to extricate itself from the cot and bedding with a sharp, piercing squeal.

Kate's eyes flashed around the shadowed room searching every nook and corner she could see as the creature finally managed to scuttle from beneath the bed to disappear behind a row of cabinets in a blur.

She hugged Newt close as she crept cautiously toward the door. Her shaking hand slapped the wall switch, but nothing happened, the door clearly disabled from outside.

 _Vaughn,_ she thought to herself as she pounded on the door knowing that the operating room they'd appropriated for their privacy had been designed specifically so no sound would carry outside the room She tried the observation window next, glancing frantically about the room, unsure from where the next assault might come.

"Hey...heeyyyyyy!" Kate shouted into the microphone pickup for the security camera as she pounded on the window. Through the double-paned window, she could see that the lab was dark and empty. Kate heard the loathsome sound of scrabbling tiny feet behind her, feeding her panic. Newt started to whimper as well, the girl's own anxiety feeding off her fear as Kate shouted for help, waving her arms at the security camera.

* * *

Eric Vaughn had surprised everybody by volunteering to take a turn at the security station so Ryan could get a few minutes rest and have some coffee. He'd had his own agenda, though nobody knew it as of yet. For his plan to work help would have to come too late. After Kate had threatened him, it seemed almost ironic to use her as the hiding place for his smuggled cargo. His original plan had called for using Dr. Rodgers to transport the parasite, but Castle waking in the middle of the night to look in on her had been pure serendipity at work. Allowing him to kill two birds with one stone and give him two specimens to return to the Bio-Weapons division for the price of one. He'd only have to get rid of Castle somehow, hopefully before they could report to the Sulaco's captain.

The notes from the Nostromo's synthetic, Ash, recovered from the escape shuttle's _"missing"_ logs had been quite detailed and inhumanly specific regarding the progression of symptoms during and after embryo implantation. By the time Beckett woke up and could remember more than her name, it would be far, far too late for her to tell anyone anything - much less the Commerce Commission - and even if she did, he would be too valuable an asset for Weyland-Yutani _not_ to protect by then He'd be set for life.

 _You should have wised up and worked with me, Beckett,_ Vaughn thought to himself, _Uncle Bill was right, you're too idealistic for your own damn good._

He switched off the monitor showing Kate's plight, then straightened casually in his seat behind the console, hiding his actions by pretending to stretch. His great uncle, William Bracken had told him precisely how to deal with her, and it worked like a charm.

"Understood, Bishop," Sgt Esposito stated into his headset, "Nice work, Check in again when you have an ETA for me."

"He's at the up-link tower." Esposito said when he noticed Vaughn's curious glance.

"Excellent." Vaughn replied. He'd go back and dispose of the evidence later. The explosion of the Atmosphere processing plant would cover the rest of his sins.

* * *

Castle woke with a start.

He hadn't intended to drift off at Alexis' bedside, only to make sure she was comfortable and sleeping soundly, before returning to Kate and Newt, but he was every bit as bone tired as Kate and Newt had been and all of the excitement and hard work of the previous day had not helped matters. He sat up, stretching out his back experimentally which cracked and twinged with discomfort.

"I better get back to them, Pumpkin, Newt will wonder where I went," he whispered as much to himself as his daughter and brushed a kiss to her forehead, already plotting a family trip to the Hamptons when this was all over. His mind spilling over with hopeful possibilities of getting Jim out of the senior center and making some happy family memories.

When he reached down next to the door to pick up the pulse rifle he brought, it was gone. He tried the door, only to find it locked from the outside and the security camera disabled. He began to pound furiously on the door, shouting, though he knew nobody was in the hallway to hear him.

* * *

Kate picked up a steel chair and slammed it against the observation window, but to no effect, the glass clearly having been designed to protect the rest of the lab from airborne contagions. From outside the med lab, there was little to show for her futile efforts, the chair's impact barely audible through the double thickness pressurized partition.

Kate turned and rummaged through the clutter of equipment on the counter next to her to find a small flashlight. Snapping it on she played the beam along the floor. At every sound, she snapped the beam of light across the room, swiveling and bobbing it frantically as Newt started whimpering.

Kate forced herself to take a few deep, steadying breaths at the realization that Newt's terror was feeding upon hers. As she calmed herself, she played the flashlight beam across the ceiling, then swept back across when the nozzle for the fire suppression system caught her eye. Necessity being the mother of invention, her mind flashed upon an idea. She rummaged through her jacket pockets until she found the box of emergency flares she'd pocketed from the APC while they'd been salvaging the crates.. She boosted Newt up onto the surgical table in the center of the room and clambered up after her.

"Kate...I'm scared." Newt whispered, clinging to her leg.

"I know, honey," Kate replied, "Me too."

Kate scraped the flare on the ceiling and when it flashed to life she held it under the temperature sensor of the fire control system. It triggered, setting off an alarm she knew would be heard throughout the complex, as the sprinkler system snapped on, spraying the room with water.

* * *

Castle had been pounding on the door for several minutes and had begun to contemplate disassembling the control panel when the fire alarm sounded, then a loud click from inside the door, which promptly slid aside as a smooth voice said:

" _Attention: Fire control system tripped in Med-lab Operating Room "A", Evacuation procedures are now in effect. Please exit the medical wing in an orderly manner and report to your assigned fire control stations."_

He was out the door and on his way around the corner before the complex's VI could finish speaking the words.

* * *

Esposito jumped at the sound of the alarm, and the building's virtual intelligence, then bolted for the door, yelling into his headset as he ran.

"Vasquez, Hudson, meet me in medical! We got a fire!"

Vaughn sat and waited, knowing there really wasn't anywhere for him to run. He hoped he'd given the two parasites enough time to finish their work. His hastily conceived backup plan would call for Castle to be so distraught at the sight of his worst nightmare - his wife and granddaughter incapacitated by the larval forms of the Alien species - that his own involvement might go unnoticed.

It was the one non-calculated risk of his plan.

He would have to do some fast talking with the Sulaco's captain, followed by some careful sabotage of a few freezers on the way home -namely Castle and the rest of the ground team - thankfully he'd prepared for this contingency with a flash drive carefully hidden in his cabin on the Sulaco. He'd only need a few moments unobserved in the hyper-sleep pod chamber.

Provided he survived the next few hours he wouldn't have anything to fear ever again.

* * *

Kate and Newt were drenched by the sprinklers within seconds continued to drizzle in the darkness. As the station's VI droned on, both masking all other sounds, a possibility she had not taken into consideration. Kate scanned the room with the flashlight, her hair plastered to her face, water in her eyes. She looked into the tangle of arms and cables of the ceiling mounted multi-light for the surgical table she and Newt were sanding on. Just as she began to turn away her eyes snapped back to it at the first sign of movement.

Without warning, one of the hand shaped things leaped at her face. She screamed and toppled off the table, dragging Newt with her , sending them both crashing to the floor. Newt shrieked and scrambled away as Kate hurled the creature off of her before it could get a grip with either tail or feet. It slammed against a wall of cabinets, turned about, then sprang straight back at her again.

Kate scrambled, crab-walking backward desperately, dragging everything she could reach between herself and the and the nightmarish hand shaped abomination chasing her across the floor. In a blur of multi-jointed finger-like legs the creature scuttled up her body. Kate tore at it, but it was too fast, avoiding her fumbling hands, her fingers unable to find purchase on its wet skin. Newt screamed over and over, backing away until she reached a desk in the opposite corner and could flee no further.

Kate managed to get both hands up in a last desperate attempt to save herself, trying to force the pulsing creature's palm and impregnation tube back from her face. The thing wrapped its tail around her throat and began to tighten, slowly cutting off her air supply, forcing the underside of its body closer to her face. Kate thrashed about, trying to push or pull the thing away from her, but the water that splashed in her eyes, blinding her also made it impossible for her fingers to get a firm grip on the creature's body.

She could feel her vision graying out, her arms and hands losing the fight to keep it at bay as it's tail continued to inexorably tighten.

Crablike legs appeared from behind the desk, right behind Newt. She saw the thing at the last second and instinctively, jammed the desk against the wall with all of her strength, pinning the writhing creature's back to the wall. The desk jumped and shuddered against against her hands as she shoved with all of the might her tiny body could muster. Newt grunted between gritted teeth as the second creature slid one leg free, then another and another. Drawing itself inexorably closer to the desktop toward her.

On the other side of the room, the other creature clawed at Kate's head, getting a surer grip no matter how she struggled. The tube extended wetly from the sheath on the creature's underside, forcing itself between her arms crossed tightly over her face as the pressure from its squeezing tail forced her mouth open.

* * *

Castle rounded the corner to the room where he'd left Kate and Newt to find both of their pulse rifles leaning against the wall. He tried the door to find it still locked, then ran to the observation window, grabbing his rifle as he went and banged on it with the butt-stock over and over, his pounding having no more effect than Kate had with the chair earlier. The nightmare vision inside spurred him to action. As Esposito, Vasquez and Hudson rounded the corner, Castle aimed at the window and pulled the trigger...

* * *

A figure appeared at the observation window, a silhouette behind the misted-over glass, followed by a burst of pulse-rifle fire shattered the tempered glass. Esposito exploded through the spider webbed glass and into the room in a shower of fragments with Castle, Vasquez and Hudson right behind him.

Esposito rolled, his body armor grinding through the shards, and slid across to Kate. He wrapped his fingers around the thrashing legs of the vicious hand-shaped beast and pulled...hard, forcing it away from her face, Kate still losing strength as the tail tightened sickeningly around her throat.

Hudson, meanwhile, leaped behind Newt and planted one boot on the table, trapping the creature by its tail.

"Christ kid, look out!" He shouted, shoving Newt behind him as he unleashed a burst from his pulse-rifle into the second creature at point-blank range sending smoking acid and body parts spattering against the wall.

Gorman appeared at Kate's side seemingly from nowhere and grabbed the end of the creature's tail, unwinding it like a boa constrictor from her throat and Kate collapsed, gagging to the floor. Both Gorman and Espo gripped the struggling, creature between them.

"The empty corner!" Espo shouted to Castle, nodding where he intended them to throw the thing, "Ready?"

"Do it!" Castle shouted, pointing his rifle at the space indicated.

Esposito and Gorman swung back once and hurled the thing into the corner, where it immediately scrabbled upright and leaped back toward them, but Castle reduced it to acid and gore with a single short burst, before dropping his rifle to kneel at Kate's side and help her sit up while she caught her breath.

"Vaughn," Kate choked out, still gasping for air, "it was Vaughn."

Castle shot a glance at Newt, then one at Esposito as blind, murderous rage bubbled to the surface within him. He rose to his feet and stalked out the door, his vision seeing nothing but red.

"Castle! No!" Kate called after him, but he disappeared out the door, her warning unheard.

* * *

Vaughn hadn't known what to expect when the door leading to medical finally snapped back open, but it hadn't been Richard Castle angrily stalking him like prey with murder in his eyes.

He backed away, but to no avail, Castle was on him before he got three paces.

"You son of a bitch!" Castle shouted as his first punch snaked out, catching Vaughn in the midsection, doubling him over like a card table. He grabbed Vaughn's collar to haul him back up, then shoved violently, sending him sprawling over the map table and onto the floor on the other side.

"Get up, you cowardly fuck!" Castle shouted, following right behind "I'm not asleep like Kate and Newt were, come at me like a fucking man!"

Castle dragged Vaughn off the floor and pinned him to the wall, punching him in the face once, twice, then a third time before he felt Kate's hand wrap around his wrist to stop him from beating the man to death, blunting his rage. Castle sagged, releasing Vaughn, allowing him to sink to the floor unconscious.

* * *

A few minutes later, Vaughn sat in a chair in the corner surrounded by angry Marines, maintaining an air of icy calm though beads of sweat betrayed his concealed tension. He knew he was in deep shit.

"Vasquez found Dietrich's body in a supply closet," Ryan said, dropping a used pressure hypodermic onto the map table, "I doubt she even saw the hypodermic coming."

"I say we grease this rat-fuck son of a bitch right now!" Hudson exclaimed, pointing his gun at Vaughn's bruised face.

"I don't get it." Esposito rambled, pacing, "It doesn't make any Goddamn sense."

Kate stood between her husband and Vaughn, glaring at the man. Part of her wanted to kill the man with her bare hands herself. She could almost imagine her hands wrapped around his throat cutting of his oxygen just like the creature's tail had been doing to her mere minutes ago.

Vaughn tried to break Kate's glare by staring back at her intensely, which had always worked before, but not now. His hold over her - which he had carefully cultivated since she woke from hyper-sleep back on Gateway Station - had been irrevocably broken.

"He admitted to me that he wanted to bring an alien for the company R&D labs," Kate offered. "He wouldn't have been able to get one through quarantine, but if one of us were impregnated ...whatever you call it...and then frozen for the trip back at just the right time... nobody would know about the embryos we were carrying. I threatened to expose him, so he needed me out of the way. Newt was likely just an insurance policy."

Kate turned toward Newt where she sat nearby, hugging her knees, all but lost in the adult jacket Vasquez had found and thrown over her shoulders, her still-damp hair plastered to her forehead and cheeks. The angry Hispanic woman hovering over Newt like a mother hen glaring at Vaughn as if deciding which body part to tear off of him first.

"Wait a minute," Ryan interjected, " _We'd_ know about it."

"The only way his plan could have worked," Castle added, staring at Vaughn with cold, dead, empty eyes, which unnerved the man more than the whole room of angry ones, "would be to sabotage certain freezers on the trip back. With us gone, he could make up any story he liked."

"Fuuuck! He's dead." Hudson stated, then turned to Vaughn, "You're dog-meat, pal."

"Do you people hear yourselves?" Vaughn said, trying to sound calm, "This is total paranoid delusion, it's pitiful."

"Vaughn, I don't know which species is worse." Kate replied icily, "You don't see _them_ screwing each other over for a Goddamn percentage."

"I say we waste him," Esposito said, "No offense, Vaughn."

"Just find someplace to lock him up until it's time to..." Kate began,

Before she could finish her thought, motion sensor alarms went off. On the main monitor's screen, they could see the sentry gun in the tunnel open fire. Simultaneously, the APC's chain guns could be heard hammering outside.

* * *

In the tunnel, the sentry gun blasted out its staccato rhythm. The barrel overheating, glowing cherry red before its bolt clicked empty, the weapon still swiveling to track targets it could no longer fire upon. The creature's overran it within seconds as they crashed against the sealed door, acid smoking against metal.

* * *

"Sentry gun in the tunnel's down," Ryan reported bleakly, "with all that acid spattering around, the door won't hold for long."

Shortly after that, the APC's chain guns also fell silent, followed by loud crashing noises echoing up from sub-level.

"There goes the fire door." Hudson added. An instant later motion-sensor alarms began to wail and Ryan looked at the tactical board.

"Well, they're into the complex." he stated, just before the power went out throwing the entire complex into darkness. After the battery powered emergency lights snapped on, everything had gone blank.

"They cut the power." Castle and Beckett whispered in unison.

"What do you mean, they cut the power?" Hudson shouted in a panic, "How could they cut the power, man? They're animals!"

Kate tossed Castle his rifle and thumbed off the safety on her own.

"Newt! Stay close," Kate commanded, her voice galvanizing the others into motion. "Let's get some trackers going. Ryan go get Alexis! Gorman, watch Burke!"

Hudson and Vasquez picked up their portable motion detectors and moved to the door. Vasquez slid it open manually on its track and the two troopers moved rapidly to the barriers at opposite ends of the control block.

Vasquez moved forward with feral determination as she trained her rifle in the darkness, Hudson with slightly less enthusiasm did his work, scanning the med lab and the nearby barrier on his side of the hallway.

"Anything?" Kate shouted over her headset.

"There's something out here," Hudson replied, "can't seem to get a firm lock".

He swept his tracker around, first one way and then back down the corridor until he got a firmer signal, and shouted, "Whatever it is, it's inside the complex."

"You're just reading me." Vasquez replied through his headset.

"No!" Hudson shouted, "It ain't you, I have multiple contacts... now inside the perimeter!"

"Hudson, stay cool," Esposito commanded, "Vasquez?"

Vasquez turned back down the corridor toward Hudson's position pointing her tracker and rifle together. She aimed it back toward Hudson and swore silently in unbroken Spanish.

"Hudson may be right." She finally replied coldly.

Kate shared a look with Esposito, "Here we go."

"Get back here, both of you," Esposito commanded, "Fall back to Operations."

Both Vasquez and Hudson backed toward the door to operations, their rifles and trackers at the ready.

"Signal's weird," Hudson muttered into his headset, "must be interference or something. There's movement all over the place!"

"Just get back here!" Kate shouted.

Hudson reached the door to operations only a moment before Vasquez, they both moved pulled it closed and dogged it tight while Castle, Beckett and Esposito started laying out grenades, M-41A magazines and their one working flamethrower behind the command console.

"Movement!" Hudson shouted, bringing all activity to a halt. "Signal's clean.

Range twenty meters."

"Vasquez, Seal the door," Kate hissed. Vasquez didn't need to be told twice or look at Espo for confirmation, she picked up a hand-welder and moved to comply.

"Seventeen meters." Hudson reported, his eyes glued to the screen on his tracker.

Sparks showered around Vasquez as she began welding the door shut. The only sound in the room aside from the staccato beeping of Hudson's tracker.

"They learned." Castle hissed, "They cut the power and bypassed the hallway sentry guns somehow. They must have found another way in, something we missed."

"We didn't miss nothing." Esposito barked.

"Fifteen meters," Hudson reported as Vasquez continued to seal the door.

"Something under the floors, maybe," Kate added, the tension increasing her bond with Castle, "something not in the plans. I don't know!"

"Twelve meters!" Hudson exclaimed. "Man, this is a big fucking signal. Ten meters."

"They're right on us." Kate whispered.

"Vasquez," Esposito shouted, "how you doing?"

Vasquez answered with little more than a grunt and a nod as she ignored the sparks showering over her armor, spattering it with molten metal as she worked feverishly to weld the door shut.

"Nine meters," Hudson reported, "Eight."

"Can't be," Kate swore, "That's inside the room!"

"It's readin' right," Hudson shot back, Look for yourself!".

"Well you're not reading it right!" Esposito shouted.

"Six meters," Hudson shouted, "Five. What the fu..."

Castle and Beckett looked at each other, the thought dawning on both of them at the same time. She felt a cold dread move up her spine as she angled Vasquez' discarded tracker toward the ceiling, almost directly overhead and the tone grew louder.

Esposito noticed the shift of Castle and Beckett's gaze, climbed up onto the operations console and raised a panel of acoustic drop-ceiling with his light-bar. A soul-wrenching nightmare image moved in the beam of his light. Aliens, scores of them, as far back as his light could reach, clinging upside down to the pipes and beams of the structural ceiling as they clawed their way forward in absolute silence over the ceiling of the operations room.

Espo saw something move out of the corner of his eye, just as one of them lunged at him. He dropped backward reflexively and hit the floor, firing as he went. The entire ceiling exploded, raining debris as the nightmare shapes drop into the room.

Newt screamed right before Hudson opened fire. Vasquez grabbed Esposito and pulled him to his feet , firing one handed with her rifle in the target rich environment. Kate scooped up Newt and staggered back. Gorman turned to fire the flamethrower he'd picked up and Vaughn bolted for the only remaining exit, the corridor connecting to the med lab.

The aliens died two or three at a time as the ten millimeter explosive tipped rounds hit them, but they kept coming. Their numerical advantage undeniable, only held in check by the size of the room.

"Medical!" Kate shouted over the din, as she dashed for the corridor "Get to medical!"

Ahead of her Vaughn cleared the door to the med lab and slid it closed. Kate heard the lock snap home, just before she slammed into the door.

"Vaughn!" she shouted with all of the authority she could muster, "Open the door!"

"Kate!" Newt screeched.

Kate turned just in time to find an alien barreling down the corridor at her. Hands shaking, Kate brought her rifle up and squeezes the trigger, but nothing happens. The creature had slowed at the sight of the rifle, baring its teeth and hissing as it advanced more carefully, stalking its prey. Kate checked the safety and the indicator showing the magazine is full as Newt closed her eyes and began to wail.

Panic screamed in Kate's brain, her hands slick with sweat and trembling so badly she almost dropped her rifle. The creature was almost upon her, when the proverbial light dawned and she snapped back the charging lever, chambering a round. She brought the stock back to her shoulder and fired a long burst straight into the shrieking jaws sending the alien hurtling backward, twitching insanely in its death throes.

* * *

Operations had descended into madness. Aliens poured out of the ceiling as Castle and Espo and the other Marines hammered away at them, while backing toward the door to the medical wing. Hudson whirled and fired like a man possessed, the rising tension of the last day finally finding release as he gave in to battle madness. A demon of vengeance with fangs out, his weapon speaking death in three round bursts.

"Let's go! Let's go!" Hudson screamed hysterically, having clearly snapped, "Fuck you!" he screamed as he fired a burst into one alien then spotted another lunging at him, "You want some of this, well fuck you too!"

Hudson screamed unintelligibly as the floor panels broke loose under him, clawed arms seized him lightning fast and dragged him down as he continued to fire until another skeletal shape leaped on him from above and tore his head from his body, while unseen claws dragged his body into the sub-floor crawl-way.

* * *

Another alien approached Kate through the dissipating smoke, but she drilled it with a four round burst, the M-41A's muzzle climb sending the explosive tipped, caseless, ten millimeter rounds up its torso, the fourth round drilling it cleanly in the head.

"Hold your fire!" Espo shouted as he burst through the doorway from Operations with Castle, Vasquez and Gorman close at his heels, just as Ryan appeared from the patient room nearby, Alexis leaning against him groggily, barely able to stand. "It's us!"

"Vaughn locked us in!" Kate shouted over the ringing in her ears.

"Stand back," Esposito shouted back, knowing Kate could barely hear him as he snapped the torch off his belt and starts cutting into the lock.

More alien warriors began to gather at the far end of the corridor, prompting Vasquez to lift the muzzle of her rifle and started loading 30mm grenades into the launcher, like oversize shotgun shells.

"You can't use those in here!" Gorman shouted. Under normal conditions, he would be right, but these conditions were far from normal.

"Fire in the hole!" Vasquez shouted as she racked the bolt on the grenade launcher, stepped in front of Ryan and Alexis and fired, sending a grenade downrange into the alien standing dead center in the group, which promptly exploded, shredding all of the warriors nearby, the blast almost knocking everyone down as Espo finally kicked the door open, to usher everyone through.

Vasquez slipped through last, slid the door nearly closed, then fired three grenades rapid-fire through the gap before pulling her rifle out and slamming the door home as the grenades detonated, the explosions rumbling on the other side. Espo snapped his torch on and began to seal the door.

Kate sprinted across the room with Newt in tow and tried the far door, but Vaughn had locked that one behind him as well. Vasquez advanced behind her, retrieved her own torch and began cutting into the locking mechanism.

* * *

Vaughn turned after locking the second door, hyperventilating as he fled further down the corridor. _'This wasn't how it was supposed to go'_ he thought to himself, gasping and wheezing from a combination of exertion, adrenaline and cold primal fear. He made it to the door on the other side of the corridor leading to the main concourse and reached for the latch, but it turned by itself.

The door swung slowly open to reveal an alien warrior standing right in front of him, inner and outer jaws snapping, its tail whipping from side to side. Vaughn's eyes went wide, transfixed by the beast in front of him and managed only a brief scream before the creature's tail-stinger struck home and he saw only shadows.

* * *

The door Esposito had just finished welding shut dimpled from a hard, pounding impact, separating slightly from the frame frame. Another crash followed, along with the squeal of rending steel. Newt grabbed Kate by the hand and tugged her across the room.

"Come on!" Newt hissed, trying to make as little noise as possible, "This way."

She lead Kate to an air vent set low in the wall and expertly unlatched the grille, and swung it open, but Kate pulls her back before she can step inside, unable to ignore the parallel to Captain Kim's foray into the air vents of the Nostromo.

"Stay behind me." Kate admonished, trading her rifle for Gorman's flamethrower before he could protest and slid into the air shaft. Newt scrambled in behind, followed by Castle, Gorman Espo and Ryan - the two of them supporting Alexis - with Vasquez on rearguard. Glancing back fearfully, Newt tried to hurry Kate along as they crouched low, moving as quickly as they could through the shaft.

"Do you know how to get to the landing field from here?" Kate asked Newt.

"Sure," Newt replied, "turn left at the next intersection."

Kate turned into the larger main duct, giving all of them but Castle enough room to nearly stand fully. When they approached another intersection, Kate fired the flamethrower around the corner, before they moved through..

"Go right," Newt hissed.

"Bishop, you read me?" Esposito said into his headset, "come in, over."

"Yes, I read you," Bishop replied through heavy static, "Not very well though."

* * *

Bishop was huddled against the base of the telemetry mast, out of the now viciously gusting wind. "The drop ship is on its way," he yelled into his headset, over enunciating to compensate for the static on the line, "ETA, sixteen minutes."

Bishop's hands were a blur over the compact haptic display, doing his best to keep the drop ship on a clean descent. His eyes trained on the instruments and DCS ranging.

* * *

"Understood," Esposito replied, "stand by, we're on out way. Over."

Off in the distance, just barely within the range of her light, Kate caught sight of movement, which quickly coalesced into the form of one of the alien warrior drones,

"Back!" She hissed, "Go back!"

As the small column of people started to move back the way they came, a ventilation grate was forced in with a loud clanging of metal on metal inside the duct and the deadly form of another warrior appeared behind them, boxing them in between the two. Vasquez opened fire with her rifle, while Esposito cut into the wall of the duct with his portable torch to cut an escape route.

"Running dry," Vasquez muttered darkly, as the dark shapes closed in and Esposito's torch sputtered out. Bracing himself on the duct wall, he kicked hard at the circle of metal he'd cut bending the remaining metal to force it aside.

He slid through the searing hole, leading with his rifle, before lifting Newt safely through with Kate and Rick following close behind who turned to help pull Alexis through the opening so Ryan could slide in at the rear.

Before Gorman could step through, Vasquez' rifle clicked on an empty chamber. She dropped it and drew her service pistol just before another alien dropped from a vertical shaft. She fired several shots in quick succession and rolled aside, but the wounded alien landed on her legs, the stinger on it's tail missing her head by inches. She fired a few more shots, emptying her pistol before kicking the thing's corpse away. Acid cut through her armor, searing into her thigh and she cried out, gritting her teeth against the white-hot pain.

Gorman saw Vasquez go down, unable to move, the creatures coming toward her and turned away from the escape hole.

"Go, Sergeant!" He shouted back to Esposito, clapping him on the shoulder before he doubled back.

Firing his rifle as he went, Gorman grabbed the back of her battle harness and started dragging her toward safety only to find the approaching alien warriors had blocked their escape route, trapping them. Vasquez looked up, barely conscious, almost mortified at who had come to make their stand with her.

"You always were an asshole, Gorman." She whispered.

She clasped his hand, tightly in both of her own for just a moment, knowing what was coming for them, her hands coming away with two grenades.

"Semper Fi," Gorman whispered.

"Ooh rah," Vasquez deadpanned as they both popped the spoons on their grenades just before the approaching horde fell upon them, only to be eclipsed by fire as the four grenades exploded almost simultaneously. The force of the blast and the acid from the aliens blasted the shaft into a twisted wreck.

* * *

Taking one last look at the spot where Lt. Gorman and Private Vasquez had met their end, Esposito turned back to the others and ushered them along. There would be time for his sorrows and to honor the dead later, for now his duty was to the living.

"This way," Newt urged, tugging on Kate's hand, "Come on, we're almost there!"

"Newt, wait!" Kate hissed, but the girl moved like greased lightning, diving and dodging around obstacles, clearly in her element in these tunnels. She never hesitated in her movements, as if she had a map of the ducts hard-wired in her brain. She set a punishing pace for the larger adults following in her wake, jogging behind her until they reached a junction with a chute that angled sharply upward.

"Here!" Newt shouted "Go up that way!"

Kate looked up the shaft as Castle came even with her, Alexis holding tightly to his back. They could see light at the top of what was clearly an exterior vent hood, the wind howling overhead and cold air on their faces.

Kate stepped into the shaft, bracing her feet on the perilously narrow side ribs dotting it, with Newt directly behind her and the others emerging one at a time from the side duct.

"Just up there..." Newt began, before a loose rib collapsed under her foot. She slid back a few feet before catching herself with one hand. Kate dropped her light, her hand groping for Newt's, but missed the tips of her fingers by inches inches just as she lost her grip.

Castle lunged, grabbing the arm of her over-sized jacket, but she slipped out of it. With an echoing scream Newt plummeted, sliding down the chute into darkness.

Kate looked Castle in the eye for just a fraction of a second before she let go of the shaft to slide down the chute after Newt, bracing herself with her feet to control her descent. Quickly reaching the bottom of the chute, she found herself in a horizontal service tunnel. She picked up the light she had dropped earlier, but could find no sign of Newt. Her plaintive wail echoing in the distance.

"Moooommeeee..."

Kate could hear Newt's pitiful cries for her mother and it tore her heart out.

"Castle, Espo, get down here," Kate barked into her headset, "I need that locator."

"Newt!" Kate shouted as loud as she could, "Stay right where you are! We're coming sweetie!"

Kate was quickly joined by Esposito and Castle, who had left Alexis with Ryan only moments before. Espo unsnapped the emergency-locator from his belt and the three of them followed the signal into a lighted area that still had power.

"This way," Esposito whispered, "She's close by."

They follow the signal until they come to a grille set in the floor and saw Newt's tiny hands reaching up through the grating.

"Here! I'm here. I'm here." she cried out wiggling her fingers.

Castle and Beckett ran to the grating and looked down to see Newt's tear-streaked face, her tiny fingers wriggling up through the bars of the grate and both of them touch the child's fingertips reassuringly.

"Climb down, honey," Kate whispered, "We have to cut through the grate."

Newt backed away, climbing down the pipe as Esposito slapped a new can of fuel into his hand-torch and started cutting into the bars.

Standing waist deep in the water, cold and terrified, Newt bit her lip, trembling as she watched sparks shower into the water as Esposito worked, not noticing the glistening black shape rising from the water behind her until it towered over her, dwarfing her tiny form. Newt turned and screamed as the shadow engulfed her.

Kate kicked desperately at the grating, when she heard Newt scream, smashing it down. Heedless of the cherry-hot edges Kate lunged toward the hole before Castle could stop her.

"Newt!" Kate screamed into the darkness, "Newt!"

Kate played her flashlight over the surface of the once again placid water, but Newt was nowhere to be found, the only visible sign she had ever been there was "Casey." The doll head, stared glassily back at her from the surface of the water before it sank, vanishing slowly into the darkness.

Castle grabbed Kate around the waist and pulled her away from the hole in the deck, but she fought him tooth and nail, struggling to tear out of his grip.

"No!" Kate screamed, "Noooo!" But Castle was stronger, as he dragged her back, hauling against her with all of his strength until she finally succumbed..

"She's gone!" Esposito shouted, hating himself for saying it, he liked the little girl too, but he could see more dark dark shapes moving toward them through a lattice of pipes, "Let's go!"

Kate struggled weakly, almost hysterical, "No! No! She's alive! We have to..."

"I know Kate," Castle whispered into her hair as he tugged her back, "I know, but if we want any chance of saving her, we gotta get moving! Now!"

With Esposito leading the way Castle dragged Kate to a service elevator that still seemed to have power - noting in the back of his mind the elegant proof of the creatures' intelligence, as they had only cut the power to operations and not the rest of the complex - hauled her inside and pressed her against the back wall.

Esposito hit the button to take them to the surface level just as an alien warrior leaped into the tunnel and started toward them with preternatural speed and managed to get one arm through, the doors which reopen due to the obstruction. Before the creature could press its advantage, Esposito opened fire with a four round burst into its chest. It screeched in pain as it was forced back, spraying acid across Esposito's armored chest plate as it fell backward out of the elevator, dead.

As the lift finally began to rise upward through its shaft, Esposito's fingers clawed at the clasps holding his armor together in a macabre race with the acid eating its way toward his skin. Galvanized out of her hysteria, Kate also clawed at his armor, helping him as much as she could. Espo screamed as the acid contacted his chest and arm. He shucked out of the combat armor like a madman, dropping the smoking pieces to the floor as acrid fumes filled the air.

The elevator stopped and the doors parted allowing them to stumble out, Castle and Beckett supporting Esposito, now doubled over in agony.

"Come on, Espo, you can make it," Kate whispered in his ear. " Almost there."

* * *

Drop-ship Beta descended toward the landing grid, side-slipping in hurricane force wind gusts, then set down on the landing platform hard, buffeted by the wind. Bishop rose from his hiding place, he and Ryan, supporting Alexis between them as Castle and Beckett - supporting a flagging Esposito – stumbled out of the building and onto the concourse behind them as they all stumbled against the wind toward the ship.

"How much time?" Kate shouted at Bishop over the wind.

"Plenty!" Bishop shouted, smiling, "Thirty-six minutes!"

"Good," Castle replied, "because we're not leaving!"

"We're not?" Bishop asked incredulously, the smile disappearing from his face as he deployed the ramp and they all rushed to board the ship.

* * *

Shortly thereafter, the drop-ship sped toward the slowly self-destructing atmosphere processing station its fusion reactor core now roaring completely out of control toward full containment breach. Lightning arcs around the superstructure and columns of incandescent gas thunder hundreds of feet into the air.

The drop-ship pivoted as it drew near the station, hovering in the blasting turbulence, before settling onto a narrow landing platform about a third of the way up the enormous structure.

Inside, Kate busily set about arming herself, taking down a pulse rifle from a weapon's rack and slapping home a full magazine, then selecting a service pistol she favored. She turned to fill a messenger bag with as many magazines for both as she could carry. Meanwhile, Castle crudely fastened an M-41A assault rifle to a flamethrower to create a massive, unwieldy package of firepower, then worked rapidly, snatching magazines, grenades, belts and other gear from the fully stocked ordnance racks of the drop-ship.

"Castle, where the hell do you think _you're_ going?" Kate asked.

"To get my granddaughter," Castle replied, "if you think I'm gonna let you go down there alone, you have another goddamn thing coming."

Bishop moved aft from the pilot's compartment, gave Alexis something to help her rest and then turned to help Ryan dress Esposito's injuries. Blessedly they had gotten his armor off before too much of the acid could burn through.

"Ms Beckett, Mr. Castle..." Bishop began, but Kate cut him off with a fierce almost predatory glare.

"She's alive," Kate insisted, "They brought her here to cocoon her and you know it."

"In case you two were not aware," Bishop stated flatly, "in twenty-seven minutes, this place will be a cloud of vapor the size of Nebraska."

Castle and Beckett went back to stuffing gear rapidly into her satchel.

"Ryan," Kate ordered, "don't let him leave."

Castle hefted his hybrid weapon, as Kate thrust the satchel on her shoulder and they headed for the open ramp.

Castle turned back for a moment and took Ryan's hand in his.

"Kevin, if we don't make it," Castle whispered, "get my daughter out of here. You and Jenny take care of her for me."

Ryan nodded solemnly as the two of them turned as one and marched down the ramp. He watched as the two of them walked down the platform and disappeared into the cavernous freight elevator, then reached up and closed the ramp.

Neither of them spoke as the elevator descended, there was nothing to be said. They were of one mind on their goal: find Newt and bring her to safety before the aliens could implant her with one of the parasites. Failure was not an option. Bars of light moved rhythmically over the two of them as they watched the landings go by as the heat grew more intense. Pipes not meant for the level of heat they were carrying glowed cherry-red and steam hissed from safety valves as the lift clattered downward floor by floor into the hot purgatory below.

They both removed their jackets and threw on battle harnesses. Kate's face and neck glistened with sweat as she bound her matted hair into a loose bun while they waited to reach the sub-basement the Marines had retreated from in disarray not more than a day before.

They checked their weapons, sliding grenades into the loops of their harnesses, before pulling back the charging levers on their rifles. Kate jammed two boxes of marking flares into the thigh pockets of her cargo pants while Castle primed the flamethrower taped and strapped to his rifle. His expression was dark and his eyes had long gone as cold as she had ever seen them, - reminding her more of Scott Dunn, or Jerry Tyson than the Richard Castle she knew - promising death to any who stood between him and his granddaughter. Kate knew that if they didn't get Newt back, neither of them would leave this building alive.

The man she loved more than anything in this world, the man who had woken her to what true love really was, had learned how to hate.

Suddenly, the elevator hit bottom and the safety cage retracted. Slowly, expectantly, the doors slid open to reveal an empty corridor. The passageway was dark, swirling with steam with the ruddy glow of super-heated pipes along corridor walls. The air itself seemed to vibrate with heat distortion. Metal pinged and knocked as the support columns were heated, in places, melting away the alien concretions.

As the two of them stepped out of the elevator and enter the maze, Kate glanced at the tracker taped to her rifle.

" _Attention,"_ the facility VI stated calmly, sounding far too much like MIRA for Kate's comfort, _"Emergency. All personnel must evacuate immediately. You now have twenty minutes to reach minimum safe distance."_

Range and direction read out in rapid-fire alpha-numeric on the locator display, Kate nodded to Castle in the direction they needed to go and they set off through the swirling steam of the alien maze. Castle fired a burst from the flamethrower attached to his rifle down the corridor before Kate dropped a flare on the floor and they move on.

They did their best to ignore the bodies wrapped in cocoons decorating the walls, many of whom they recognized as the locator signal strengthened. They turned and crouched through a low passage, then turned again, Kate dropping the marker flares at each intersection to mark the way back to the elevators.

They passed another row of recently cocooned people, when a hand shot out and grabbed Kate by the arm. Kate jumped, with a loud yelp before she recognized the face of the man sealed to the wall. Eric Vaughn.

"Kate...help me... please." Vaughn begged, his voice a low moan. "Oh God... please help me!"

Kate nodded and pressed a grenade into his hand, wrapping his fingers around the spoon, before pulling the primer for him and they moved on. Not even he deserved the fate the aliens had in store for him, but there wasn't time to save him and Newt.

" _You now have fifteen minutes to reach minimum safe distance."_ the VI droned.

They followed the tracker and turned a corner stopping when the indicator read zero. Kate looked down at the floor, horrified to see Newt's tracer bracelet, her eyes welling with tears at what that implied.

* * *

Unbeknownst to them, Newt was cocooned against a pillar at the edge of a cluster of upright alien eggs just around the corner. Her eyelids fluttered open just as the egg nearest her split at its top to reveal something stirring within. Newt stared at the egg, overcome with terror, as the jointed legs appeared one by one and she screamed as loudly as her lungs could muster as the face-hugger slowly emerged from the egg and turned toward her, exploded into a spray of greenish acid before it could tense its limbs to leap at her, leaving only the twitching tail intact hanging over the edge of the egg.

Kate stepped forward it and fired again, destroying the other two eggs and their contents, her expression, murderous. While Castle ran to Newt and began tearing tearing away the fresh resinous cocoon material to free the frightened child and pulled her up out of the cocoon and onto his back.

"I knew you'd come." Newt whispered weakly in his ear, her arms wrapping around his neck.

"Newt," Castle husked, "Hang on tight baby."

Groggily, Newt hooked her arms and legs through the belts of Castle's harness while Kate strapped her more securely to his back before they both readied their weapons. The alien warriors were on the move, slipping around the other eggs laid in the room toward them. Castle fired a long blast from his flamethrower, engulfing the eggs and the warriors in a blaze of cleansing fire. Only one made it through the flames, a living torch, which Kate dispatched cleanly with a burst from her M-41A as they backed out of the room.

They hadn't quite realized they'd gone the wrong way until they heard a high pitched shriek, like fingers scraping over a nightmare blackboard. Both of them turned reluctantly to take in the spectacle of the massive alien queen, glowering at them.

Her fanged, armored head was an unimaginable horror, atop a chitinous thorax bearing four arms and two powerful legs, which were folded grotesquely over a distended, egg-filled abdomen which swelled behind her into a great pulsing tubular sac, suspended from a lattice of pipes and conduits. Inside are countless eggs, churning their way to the end, where they emerge glistening, to be picked up by smaller, albino worker drones.

Kate pumped the slide on her grenade launcher and fired, repeating the action until she has expended the magazine tube, sending four grenades punching deep into the egg sac, where they detonate, ripping it to shreds, sending the Queen into a berserk frenzy of pain. Castle cut loose with the flamethrower, engulfing everything in flames until the tank ran dry and he cut the useless weapon loose from his rifle.

The figures of warriors and drones writhed and thrashed, either lit afire themselves, or cast in disarray by the queen's shrieks of agony as she struggled in the flames to free herself. Two warriors emerged from the boiling smoke, closing on them with murderous intent. Kate pulled the trigger on an empty magazine, but Castle dropped them with a burst from his own rifle. They retreated, backtracking until they met their trail of flares, where they turned and ran.

When they reached the freight elevators, a mass of debris had fallen down the shaft from a higher level and demolished the lift cage they descended in. Kate slammed the control for the other cage and they waited for it to make its descent, while enraged nightmare screeches filled the corridor. Both of them knew the elevator wouldn't arrive in time.

They fled to a service ladder set in the wall and scramble up the rungs just before a powerful black arm shot up through the opening, its razor claws slamming into the grille-floor inches from Kate's feet. The ladder quickly gave way to the corridor above and an open-grid emergency stairwell and the two of them sprinted upward with their precious cargo toward the safety of the drop-ship.

" _You now have five minutes to reach minimum safe distance."_ Droned the station VI.

The whine of servos announced the lift's return from the basement, both of them realizing only one explanation for it and ascended the stairs on a run, taking them two at a time only to slam the door open onto the platform and find that the drop-ship was gone.

"Bishop!" Kate screamed hysterically into the empty space where the drop-ship had been, screaming her outrage at this final act of betrayal. She scanned the sky as Castle unstrapped Newt and set the sobbing girl down onto her feet.

The lift cage rose slowly into view. They backed away toward the railing, keeping Newt behind them as they raised their weapons. There was no place left to run. The platform bucked wildly as explosions rocked the station from deep below, concussion waves rocketing up the superstructure as the lift shuddered to a stop and the doors parted.

"Close your eyes, baby." Kate whispered to Newt.

The inner lift doors opened and the queen began to unfold herself from the confines of the elevator cage. Just before the drop-ship rose right behind them, its hovering jets roaring as the ramp lowered behind them.

" _You now have thirty seconds to reach..."_ But the VI was cut off by a massive explosion as Castle and Beckett grabbed Newt and hustled up the ramp, hastily slapping the control to close it behind them before strapping themselves hurriedly into into the first set of seats they could find.

"Punch it, Bishop!" Ryan yelled.

As the drop ship spun away, clawing its way skyward, the entire lower half of the station disappeared in a massive fireball slamming everyone back in their seats as the concussion wave hit. Bishop stood the drop-ship on its tail and pored on the burners and the small craft climbed, scorched but functioning, toward the stars.

Castle, Beckett and Newt huddled together as much as their seat harnesses would allow, watching the blinding glare fade away, wide-eyed and trembling. Newt starts to cry quietly, and Castle strokes her hair.

"It's okay, baby." He whispered, "We made it. It's over."

* * *

They sat in their seats, huddled together until the scorched and battered ship was brought aboard and once again sat in its drop-cradle, steam blasting from cooling vents beside the engine and rotating clearance lights swept in the dark as they waited for the pressure in the bay to equalize.

"I gave him a shot, for the pain," Bishop whispered, nodding at Esposito when he finally got Kate's attention,, "I called ahead medics will be in soon to take him to sickbay."

Kate nodded as she undid her seat restraints before picking up Newt, Castle following close behind as Bishop led them down the aisle to the loading ramp.

"I'm sorry if I gave you a scare," Bishop explained, "but the platform was just becoming too unstable, I had to circle around and hope things didn't get too rough to take you off."

Kate turned to him, stopping partway down the ramp, to rest her hand on his shoulder. She couldn't hold onto her mistrust of the synthetic any longer. He wasn't Ash, Bishop had come back for them and saved all of their lives.

"You did okay, Bishop." She whispered, giving his shoulder a light squeeze.

"Well, thanks, Ms Beckett, I..." Bishop began, but was interrupted by an innocuous drop of liquid next to his shoe, which became less innocuous when it began to eat into the deck with a sharp, quiet hiss.

In the next instant, the sharp chitinous blade of an alien tail impaled Bishop from behind, spraying Kate and Newt with milky white android blood. Bishop thrashed, seizing the protruding section of tail in his hands, and it slowly lifted him off the deck. Above them the Queen glowered down at them from its place of concealment between the wing pylons.

" _Attention Attention,"_ the Sulaco's AI stated _, "nonhuman presence detected on the flight deck. Containment and elimination protocols engaged. Flight deck doors sealed, emergency doors down and locked."_

Drawing Bishop almost up to her eye level, she grasped him in her upper two hands and ripped him in half, flinging each half of him aside, like a torn rag doll. She descended slowly to the deck, the rotating lights glistening across its shiny black limbs, dripping acid and rage. The Queen is huge, powerful...and very pissed off, still smoking where Castle half-fried it. She descended slowly, her six limbs unfolding until she reached her ten foot height, towering over all of them.

Kate was rooted to the spot, staring hypnotized...terrified to break and run. She lowered Newt to the deck, never taking her eyes off the creature. Castle however was not so circumspect. He grabbed Kate by the arm and pushed Newt ahead of them away from the queen.

"Run Newt," He shouted, dragging Kate along with him as they ducked behind the crates and machinery of the flight deck, drawing the queen away, while Newt ran for cover.

"Here!" Kate and Castle shouted, "We're over here!"

The queen was almost upon them, when a set of metallic claws closed on the creature's head and thorax.

"Gotcha, you beastie!" David Sulaco shouted over the alarms and threw the queen across the deck with a solid crunch. "Halsey, Breckenridge, get the civilians back to the drop-ship before _Mother_ blows the bay!"

Sulaco turned and faced the Queen as she came on again in a murderous rage, locking the two in a death embrace. David closed the forks, crushing her top two limbs, spattering acid everywhere. She lashed and writhed in pain and fury as he lifted her off the ground, the acid biting into his abdomen. A flick of one finger on the control panel, opened the empty drop bay as he walked them toward it, fighting the Queen the whole way.

The Queen's lower arms ripped at him, slamming against the safety cage, denting it in. The striking teeth extend almost a meter from inside its fanged maw, shooting between the crash-bars within inches of his face, slamming into the seat cushion behind him in a spray of drool. Yellow acid foamed down the hydraulic arms toward him. The creature ripped at high-pressure hoses, scrambling to get at him or get free as they toppled forward into the empty drop bay, the Queen, pinned under David's mechanical loader.

Before he could reach for the quick release latches on his harness, however, the Queen's tail flashed out and impaled him though the stomach.

David Sulaco knew he was done for, even before the tail had cut into him. He felt the acid burning in his guts not knowing how it had managed to miss his spine. He had wondered his entire life whether he'd had it in him to do what his mother had done. Whether he'd have the courage to lay down his life for his ship, for his crew without hesitation like she had so many years before. The few people he'd opened up to about it had told him not to think like that, that he needed to not dwell on the past, or compare himself to his mother.

Now, though he finally had his answer.

He flicked a control with his left forefinger and the inner hatch leading back to the bay snapped closed. Alarm lights began to flash when he punched the bay door open command.

" _Decompression warning,"_ Mother stated, _"unsuited human presence in drop ship launch bay."_

"Command override," David gasped into his headset, "Authorization, Sulaco two seven nine four six."

He looked down at the creature and rasped, "Get off my mother's ship, you bitch." just before pressing the button opening the launch bay doors, ejecting them both out into space.

* * *

Castle and Beckett were still frantically casting about for any sign of Newt, in spite of the two heavily armed men trying to herd them back aboard the drop ship, when the alarm klaxons stopped.

" _Alien presence purged from flight deck."_ Mother broke in, _"Medical team report to flight deck to offload wounded."_

Kate dropped to the deck, drained of all strength. What the Chief engineer had done still churning in her mind as Newt fled her hiding place to be buried in hers and Castle's embrace.

Now it finally was truly over.

* * *

It took several hours after the drop ship had been cleared of the wounded to make a search for David Sulaco's body.

Kate had volunteered to fly the drop ship for the search. As they lacked a pilot, her license was temporarily reinstated by the captain's personal authority. Two suited crewman spent three hours carefully cutting his body loose from both the remains of the alien queen and the power loader before returning with him to the main airlock while Kate turned the drop-ship back toward the waiting flight deck.

His remains were carried with due reverence. The entire crew standing at evenly spaced intervals along the maintenance corridor as the flag-draped stretcher made its way from the main airlock to the ship's medical bay where he would be kept in stasis for the trip home. He would not be left here, like so many others had been. He would be brought home to be sent on eternal patrol the right way.

After the watch had been reinstated, and Esposito's recommendation for the disposition of the aliens had been given due weight. Captain Gates accepted the recommendations of the two advisers from Weyland-Yutani as well as noting Eric Vaughn's treachery in the ship's log, before she came to a decision.

"Action stations nuclear," She commanded after settling into her seat and sliding her key into the slot on her command chair, "Mr Hayes, your key, if you please."

Lt. Hayes slid his own key into the slot at his station and they both turned at the same time.

"Lock Mr Castle's coordinates into the fire control computer, depressurize tube twenty-four, and open outer doors." Gates ordered.

"Aye, Captain, tube twenty-four depressurized, outer doors open."

"Coordinates locked," the fire control officer reported.

"Fire." Captain Olivia Gates commanded, hoping she never again had to use such a weapon in anger.

The nuclear warhead tipped missile burst from the aft launch tube of the Sulaco and dove for the surface of Archeron, it's deadly payload armed as it angled on course for the alien ship that had set this whole sequence of events into motion, homing in on the signal nobody had learned how to turn off as it came within range. The torpedo smashed into the base of the "U" of the hulking monstrosity's hull, burying itself deep before the nuclear warhead detonated, vaporizing the ship and everything in it into the massive mushroom cloud that burst skyward.

* * *

Castle and Beckett watched from the observation deck as the ship that had factored into most of Castle's nightmares, and nearly all of Kate's was destroyed, whatever eggs left aboard now burned to dust. The last vestiges of a dead race, destroyed by its own weapon of mass destruction was now laid waste, never to tempt anyone ever again.

The crew of the Nostromo, and the Marines who had fallen there could finally rest in peace.

* * *

After a brief memorial for their honored dead, the Sulaco turned for home, her FTL drive powering them all back to earth and whatever destiny awaited them. Kate walked along the corridor next to Castle with Newt between them each gripping one of her hands. The ship's systems hummed comfortingly as they followed Alexis' wheelchair and Esposito's stretcher toward the freezers. Newt's head leaned against Castle's hip as she looked up at them.

"Are we going to sleep now?" Newt asked, with just a hint of fear in her eyes.

"That's right," Kate whispered reassuringly, looking forward to sleep for the first time she could remember.

"Can we dream?" Newt asked.

"Yes, sweetheart," Castle promised, brushing a kiss to her forehead, "I think we all can now."

They grew quiet as they turned the corner toward the hyper-sleep rooms, Both Kate and Rick knowing it would take time after they got home for all of their collective scars to heal, before all of the hurts to fall away behind them, but they would find a way to make their family whole again someday.

They were a family again, they had each other, and that was all that mattered.

Always.

* * *

 ****Author's Note** Just a brief epilogue and this story will be done. No I am not planning to take this any further. It was fun while it lasted, but I think this is as far as I want this to go. (seeing how Alien 3 ended with Ripley's death it really would not be my style) I kinda liked a more hopeful ending for Aliens myself. This is also on notice as the longest chapter I have ever written.  
**

 **Thank you Travis for hosting the Castle Halloween Bash and please keep the people in Paris in your prayers.**

 **Anon internet trolls begone!**


	9. Epilogue

**Chapter Nine  
Epilogue**

* * *

" _...That from these honored dead we take increased devotion  
to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion.  
That we here highly resolve these dead have not died in vain..."  
_Abraham Lincoln, November 19, 1863

* * *

 **Six Months Later  
** Sol System Frontier

Two ships hovered in formation over the planet Pluto. One was the graves registration vessel _UNSS Arlington_ , the last ship of the _Thresher_ class still in service. She had been recovered from mothballs and rebuilt from the keel up to serve in her current capacity, as well as search and rescue. Off her starboard side floated the _UNSS Sulaco_ in geosynchronous orbit of the wreck of _UNSS Thresher_ to inter the remains of David Sulaco along with six survivors of the Thresher accident, including _Thresher's_ Former captain, Admiral Andrea Parker, who had requested burial on-site.

Both crews had stood down from operations and stood at their respective fantail observation ports in full dress as the small, automated probe dropped from the _Arlington_ and made its silent journey to the wreck - still too irradiated for human life to venture near. All hands of both ships snapped to attention and saluted upon command as _Thresher's_ AI opened the dorsal cargo hold and the probe with its precious cargo of cremation canisters, descended inside and soft landed, placing six more souls on eternal patrol with their shipmates who fell that day - as well as a son who had shown that same measure of devotion when his time came to be interred with his mother.

No words were spoken on either vessel as a flight of five drop ships screamed overhead. Two from the Sulaco and three from the Arlington, one of which peeled away at the last moment to leave an empty space in the formation. Bishop, who had been rebuilt after returning, at her Captain's insistence, had been permitted the honor of piloting the ship that peeled away. As a synthetic, it was the highest honor that could be bestowed upon him for his service.

At the end of the ceremony, a plaque was placed in the Sulaco's flight deck, set into the control panel for the number one launch cradle where Lieutenant Commander David Sulaco had given his last full measure of devotion in service of his ship, unveiled by his younger sister.

The ship remained silent, out of respect not only for their own lost comrade, but for the six brothers and sisters in arms who had been interred with their shipmates in that silent tomb on the outer boundary of the Sol system. Like his mother, and the others, David's work may have been finished, but the _UNSS Sulaco_ went on, just like the Navy went on, and the Corps went on. Their work would never be finished. So long as their were threats to human life, both foreign or domestic, the Corps and the Navy would rise to meet them so that these honored dead would not have died in vain.

* * *

 **Meanwhile**

The Castle family also moved forward. It took many weeks of therapy, and several family vacations to the Hamptons, but eventually the rift between Alexis and her daughter, Rebecca in the aftermath of what the press had dubbed _"the Archeron Incident"_ was closed, and the pea-pod bond reasserted itself as it had been before. Though for a few years, Alexis' relationship with her father was strained, both from his long, unplanned absence and most especially when Newt would cry out in her sleep for Kate or her grandfather instead of her. The three adults went to Dr. Carter Burke as a family to work things out, while Newt saw a specialist in childhood trauma that Burke recommended. Eventually, with time, patience and no small amount of tears, they found their equilibrium again as a family.

* * *

Javier Esposito recovered fully from his injuries on Archeron and in later years went on to become the Sergeant Major of the Colonial Marine Corps. When asked why he had accepted the post instead of retiring, he said that he owed it to the memory of Master Sergeant Apone to make sure what happened to his Marines on Archeron was never allowed to happen again.

* * *

In the course of the NCIS investigation into the actions of Eric Vaughn and the corporate board of directors that followed, it came to light from evidence found in Vaughn's temporary quarters on the Sulaco that the Weyland-Yutani Corporation had known even before the loss of the _Nostromo_ how dangerous the alien xenomorphs had been and that the the corporation had deliberately withheld vital information about the threat they posed on Archeron from the Corps, leading to the loss of nearly two full squads of Marines and the Sulaco's chief engineer.

To that end, the Terran Colonial Navy and Marine Corps brought criminal charges against the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Both the military tribunal and civilian criminal proceedings that followed found the Corporate officials - both past and present - criminally liable for all losses of life which stemmed from the failed mission of the _UNSS Prometheus,_ including the loss of both ship's crews, the colony at Archeron and the loss of half a platoon of Colonial Marines.

* * *

On top of the charges levied by the military, the civilian courts charged Weyland-Yutani Corporate officials with three hundred eighty-five counts of criminally negligent homicide for sending the colonists to the Alien ship with no warning about what awaited them there.

The resulting media condemnation and class action lawsuits that followed nearly drove the Weyland-Yutani Corporation into bankruptcy.

* * *

As a result of those investigations, Warrant Officer Kate Beckett's case was reopened and she was fully exonerated of any wrongdoing in the destruction of _UNSS Nostromo._ As such, her pilot's license and Warrant Officer certifications were summarily reinstated, though she chose never to go back into deep space again. Instead, she capitalized on her new-found celebrity to throw her hat back into the political arena, where she was swiftly elected to represent the United States in the Terran Planetary Congress. For the next sixteen years, with Kevin Ryan, who had been honorably discharged from the Colonial Navy, as her chief of staff and military adviser, she was a tireless advocate for political and corporate reform, environmental regulation and Veterans affairs.

* * *

In the wake of the Weyland-Yutani scandal, Richard Castle wrote his first Non-fiction book, an account of the Nostromo's final voyage, which included Kate's memories of what happened while he was incapacitated, along with the newly recovered information from the shuttle. The book went on to win a Pulitzer prize for documentary literature. He then delved back into fiction to write a series of political thrillers inspired by his wife. Though they never did have children of their own, they practically doted on their grandchildren. Their lives were rich and full.

* * *

Nobody knew what happened to former Senator William Bracken. Three days after he was granted a medical parole from prison, he disappeared without a trace. He was last seen getting into a car driven by an elderly man bearing a striking resemblance to a drawing in the NYPD archives in connection with the Alexis Castle kidnapping and a slightly younger woman with red hair. The car was later found on fire in Upstate, NY.

The End

* * *

 ** _**Author's Note** There you have it, the end of my Alien story. I hope you all liked it. It was an interesting ride, but I story I really wanted to tell. I'm sorry if there were people who were unwilling to read it due to the source material. Now that it is completely finished, I hope those people will give it a go anyway. Like Garrae, they might be pleasantly surprised._**

 ** _To the Anon internet trolls. Well, I really don't have anything to say about them that hasn't already been said. So that 's all I have to say about that._**

 ** _Thank you to those who have been following this story with interest, and to Travis for setting up the Halloween Bash. Have a Happy Thanksgiving everybody!_**


End file.
